


The Deepest Secret

by glittercracker



Category: Hunter X Hunter
Genre: Angst, Canon typical, Canon-Typical Violence, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Explicit Sexual Content, Extreme angst, F/M, Fluff, HxHBB18, M/M, Swearing, Well tagged in the places it occurs, actually, and Kittens, and then extreme fluff, brief mention of a formerly suicidal mental state, canon typical misgendering, no kittens - just wondered if you were actually reading this!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-08-02
Packaged: 2019-05-02 01:02:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 66,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14533293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glittercracker/pseuds/glittercracker
Summary: It’s been five years since Gon and Killua said good-bye at the World Tree, with promises to write and meet again. But for the past two and a half of those years, Killua has dropped out of contact with Gon, without explanation. A quietly heartbroken Gon has come to believe that he’ll never see his childhood friend again, and settled back into his life on Whale Island: until the day when he finds Killua on the doorstep, emotionally shattered and on the verge of physical collapse. Illumi has kidnapped Alluka, and Killua believes that Gon is the only person who can help him find her...





	1. 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fireolin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fireolin/gifts).



> Chapter 1 of my unexpectedly massive first Big Bang fic ever! Reunion fic with all the trimmings. It's finished, and I'm aiming to edit then post 1 chapter a week. I hope you like it! Talk to me on tumblr if you like bc I LOVE to talk! [my tumblr](http://glittercracker.tumblr.com/%22%3ETumblr)
> 
> Many many thanks to my betas, fireolin, KnightOfSixthmagnitudeStars & losing_sanity_fast
> 
> Thanks also to all of the new friends who gave advice and support on the writers' discord during this event, particularly HanaKaicho, snarkysnark, & xyliane.
> 
> Finally, I rated this E because there is some explicit sex. But the majority of the fic is more like T, and I've given advance warning where there is smut, and ways to avoid it if you don't want to read it.

**Whale Island**

**A Tuesday, End of May**

1

 

It was stupid. Everything that his math teacher assigned was as stupid as the man was himself (or so he assumed, never having met him in person.) Gon had shattered so many pencils in frustration at so many homework assignments that Aunt Mito had taken to charging him for them. But he couldn’t help his frustration, or his strength. And now, in the spring of his last year of school – one year late, and five years since he’d put away his Hunter license in the back of a dresser drawer – he was at the limit of his self-control. Maybe it was a good thing, he’d thought more than once, that he’d lost his nen. If he hadn’t, the broken pencils would likely have turned into tiny, splintered, flying wooden missiles, and who knew where _that_ would have gotten him.

 No place better than this, he sighed, erasing an answer that was definitely not the right one.

 Gon wasn’t usually one to dwell on anything unpleasant for long, but more and more often he found himself lying awake in his drafty room when Mito and his great-grandmother were long since asleep, the old stone house on the sea cliff silent except for the creaking of beams and the keening of the wind around the eaves and the distant wash of waves. He would think about the past, those two years that he’d spent exploring the world with his friends (or friend, because there had never been any doubt that it was Killua who had inspired him the most.)

 He would wonder what he was going to do when the final exams were behind him. He was no scholar; in fact he had no desire to spend a second more on studying than was absolutely necessary. But his desire to travel as a Hunter had fled with Killua, in one long, final look before Gon turned to the World Tree, and Killua walked with his sister into the unknown. When he’d set foot back on Whale Island months later, he’d pushed all remaining memories of the friends and adventures he’d had to the back of the drawer with his license.

 Since then, he’d taken the odd trip with Kite, but he’d lost the desire to wander endlessly. If he wasn’t going to traverse the world as a Hunter, then Whale Island was the only place he wanted to be. But what would he do here? Work at the bar with Mito? Go on dates with the girls from the summertime cruise ships who always seemed to find him and cluster to him like flies to fruit? He shook his head, just as his pencil crumbled to sawdust on the page of equations he’d forgotten about in his worry.

 He regarded the ravaged pencil for a moment, wondering whether it was worth fetching another. And then there was a sound, and he jumped. He’d been so lost in thought that he hadn’t really registered where it had come from. But Mito had taken Abe out for some fresh air in the warm springtime afternoon, and so it couldn’t have come from inside the house. He was looking at the wreckage of his pencil, trying to decide whether he’d imagined the sound, when it came again.

 This time, it was clear: it was a knock on the door. But it was so faint; it was more like the stutter of rain during a sea-storm. Gon shoved his chair back from the kitchen table, thrilled for the distraction, and practically ran for the door. He threw it open, expecting one of Abe’s friends, given the weak knock – and then it was his turn to go weak. It wasn’t an old woman standing on the worn sandstone doorstep, but a figure Gon would have known anywhere, in any place, no matter how many years had passed.

 “Killua?” he asked, his tone hushed, disbelieving.

 Gon had imagined this moment more times than he could count. Through all of the long, dull years he’d passed since leaving his friend, thousands of scenes had formed in his mind, usually unbidden. But he had never imagined it like this. He had never imagined Killua broken. Yet here he was, lean and taller than Gon now by several inches, though his head was hanging and his shoulders hunched. His cheeks bordered on hollow, his skin was waxy, and the blue eyes he raised to meet Gon’s seemed dusted in a layer of ash. Killua blinked once, and then they were brimming with tears.

 “Oh, Killua…” Gon said, and he wrapped his arms around him, laying a gentle, sun-brown hand on his white hair as Killua dropped his head onto Gon’s shoulder, and wept.

 

*

 

It was a long time before Killua stopped crying. By then, Gon had moved them both to a comfortable couch by one of the windows, and the sun had traveled far enough to slant across them, holding them in a warm hand. Even when Killua’s sobs finally stilled, he stayed for a long time with his head in the crease between Gon’s neck and shoulder, letting Gon rub his back, allowing himself to be soothed.

 At last, he lifted himself up off of Gon, pushed back against the arm of the couch. He looked at Gon for a long moment, eyes swept clear by tears, like the sky after a storm. “Gon,” Killua said, his voice still hitching, “I know it’s been so long. So many years since I last wrote – ”

 “Two,” Gon said with abject certainty. “Two years and five months and three days since your last email.”

 Killua choked on a laugh, although he still looked miserable. “You’re still blunt as all hell, I see.”

 “I tell the truth,” Gon answered resolutely, his eyes steady on his friend’s. Salt crystals had formed in Killua’s white eyelashes where his tears had dried, clumping them together, and they glittered like glass dust in the sinking light. Though he tried, Gon couldn’t take his eyes off of them.

 Killua sighed. “I know that. It’s one of the things I – ” He stopped, shook his head. “Look, Gon, I’m sorry about this. I mean, I disappear for years, and then I show up on your doorstep and cry all over you – ”

 “That doesn’t matter. You’re _here.”_

 Killua looked as though he might cry again, so Gon reached for him. But this time, Killua blocked his hand. “No. I’m not going to break down again – there’s no time to waste on that. And I know that you have questions, but there’s no time for them, either. So I guess I’ll be blunt, too. I’m here because I need you.”

 Gon smiled, a small warmth kindling in his core. “You need me?”

 But Killua didn’t smile. He only drew a deep breath. “It’s Alluka, Gon,” he said in that broken voice. “She’s disappeared.”

 Gon blinked, suddenly serious. “Disappeared from where?”

 “Lukso Province.”

 “Isn’t that where Kurapika’s from?”

 “Yeah. It’s pretty much the ass end of nowhere, which is why it was perfect. We had a little house in the hills, not too far from this village where people were friendly, but didn’t ask too many questions. It was pretty. Peaceful after all the time we spent in Yorkshin, getting Alluka’s surgeries. She needed a place like that afterward. She never liked the city. In Lukso she could stop and breathe. Get used to the changes at her own pace…”

 He looked up at Gon, clearly expecting questions, but Gon just waited patiently for him to continue. “I really thought we were safe,” Killua said at last. “I mean, if our family was going to come looking for us, Yorkshin would have been the obvious place, but it never happened. And then, a few weeks ago, I left to buy food, and when I came back Alluka was gone. Everything in her room was the same. She hadn’t taken anything with her, but she was _gone.”_

 Gon watched Killua carefully, afraid of saying the wrong thing. “Do you think that maybe she left on her own?” he ventured at last. “I mean she’s sixteen now, right? Maybe she got tired of living far away from everything.”

 Blue eyes clouding, Killua shook his head again, and when he answered his voice was low and anxious. “She didn’t leave by choice.” Killua reached into the pocket of his shorts and pulled out a crumpled bit of newsprint and something small and shiny. He placed them into Gon’s upturned palm.

 The shiny object was a long, gold-hued pin, thickening toward the top where it was capped with a sphere. Gon went cold. “Isn’t this one of Illumi’s needles? Like the kind he had when he was disguised during the Hunter exam?”

 “Yes,” Killua said. “Read the clipping.”

 Gon set down the needle and unfolded the worn bit of paper. It appeared to have been torn quickly from a newspaper. It was only a headline and a sliver of story, but the headline was all he needed: “Silva Zoldyk, Head of Padokia’s Most Prominent Family, Killed In Airship Disaster.” Gon looked up at Killua in shock.

 “It’s true,” Killua said, his voice oddly flat. “My father is really dead, according to every source I could locate. I guess that’s why Illumi came looking for us again, and this time, he found us. He took Alluka. And Gon – ” He drew another deep breath, let it out, his eyes rising once more to Gon’s. “I think that you’re the only one who can find her.”

 

2

 

Gon looked at Killua for a long moment, trying to digest it all while he took in the changes in his friend. Killua had grown tall and willowy, like his mother. His voice was lower, a musical tenor. But his pearl-pale skin and blue eyes, his long, delicate fingers weren’t any different than Gon remembered. It didn’t seem real, that the boy he’d missed and longed for for so many years was now sitting inches from him, no longer a boy but a young man. And he was asking him for something requiring so much trust that Gon could barely make himself believe it.

 “Why?” Gon asked after another moment. “Killua…why would you ask me?”

 “Because I couldn’t find her. Either of them. Believe me, I tried. They weren’t at the family house, or anywhere else that I could imagine him taking her.”

 “There are better Hunters than me out there, Killua,” Gon persisted.

 Killua leaned forward, his eyes darkening. “Only _you_ could possibly understand what this means to me.”

 Gon’s head spun. In his own estimation, he was nothing since he’d lost his nen. It was one of the reasons why he’d never tried to seek out Killua in all of those years since they parted: he knew that he would only drag him down, make him and Alluka more likely to be caught by Illumi.

 They looked at each other for a long, silent moment. Outside, clouds had blown in to cover the sun, and shadows cloaked the normally cheerful room. Killua shivered, and so Gon reached clumsily for his hands. Once, years ago, their hands had been the same size. Now Gon’s were bigger, red-brown and scarred and callused around Killua’s moon-white ones. Killua had always pulled away when Gon had tried to hold his hand before, but now he seemed more than grateful for the enveloping warmth. His fingers tightened ever so slightly around Gon’s.

 In return, Gon felt something he hadn’t felt in years: a faint tingle that signaled the wakening of his aura, not unlike what he’d felt when he and Killua first began to train with Wing and Zushi. Yet at the same time it was utterly different. There was no easy hook to this tug, no clear way to catch it. So he made himself be calm, in the way of the meditations he had practiced every day since he left his father, hoping one day to regain the power he’d thrown away. He let himself simply feel it.

 “Killua,” Gon said softly, strengthening his grip when Killua didn’t pull away, and feeling the tingle strengthen with it, “you know that I would do anything for you and Alluka. But my nen is still gone. I’ve tried, but it’s never come back.”

 Killua shrugged. “I didn’t expect that it would have. But,” he looked up at Gon, and for a moment Gon stopped breathing under the intensity of Killua’s gaze, “that doesn’t change anything. Neither of us could use nen when we first met, and you were still so strong. Do you remember how you broke Illumi’s arm during the Hunter Exam?” They both smiled at the memory. “And you can track, Gon. You could do that before you ever knew about nen. You can find her. I know you can.”

 Gon was troubled by the determined look in Killua’s eyes. Clearly Killua had settled on this; he had no other plan. “You know that I’ve done nothing with my Hunter license since…since the World Tree.”

Killua retrieved his hands at last and crossed them behind his head. Gon felt a jolt of cold at the loss of them, the tingling dissipating, but he tried not to show it. “That doesn’t matter to me.”

 Gon looked at Killua for another long moment. The gray light was fading now from the window, and Mito and Abe would be back soon. “Killua – of course I’ll go with you,” he blurted. “I’d do anything for you!”

 Killua dropped his hands as a blush crawled up his face, finishing in a bright-pink tipping to his ears. “It’s only this one thing I’m asking, Gon,” he said, not quite meeting Gon’s eye. “But I know it’s a lot, even so.”

 “No!” Gon cried. “It’s nothing compared to what you and Alluka did for me.” Killua still wouldn’t meet his eyes, but Gon continued, “The only thing is, Aunt Mito will be very unhappy if I leave high school before I graduate. And with my math grades, I’m not sure I _will_ graduate. I didn’t last year.”

 Killua glanced up then, gave Gon an incisive look. “Math? What are you doing? And when are your exams?”

 Gon looked away, flushing himself, now. “I…really don’t know what I’m doing. That’s the problem. And the exams are the end of this week.”

 Killua’s eyes narrowed. “But you do school by correspondence, right? Can’t you take them early?”

 Gon shrugged helplessly. “No. The government sets the dates, and emails the exams to everyone at the same time, so you can’t cheat. But even if I could, it wouldn’t help you. The next ferry doesn’t leave till Friday evening.”

 “Shit,” Killua said, his forehead sinking into his palm. “Four days? In four days, they could be anywhere! He could be doing anything to her!”

 “They could be anywhere _now_ ,” Gon pointed out, “and if things are like they were when you first ran away, Illumi’s not going to hurt Alluka, because he needs her to get whatever it is he wants from you this time.”

 For a moment, Killua looked furious. And then the expression slackened again, melted into that terrible, hollow laughter. “I’m glad to see that five years of civilian life haven’t made you pull punches.”

 “Killua, I’m sorry – ” Gon began earnestly, but Killua interrupted.

“Don’t. That wasn’t sarcasm. I was really afraid that you would be…” He trailed off, leaving Gon to wonder what it was that he had feared, how he could have changed that would upset Killua. “Okay, so I’ll make you a deal,” Killua continued. “I’ll help you pass your exams, and then you help me find my sister.”

 Amber and blue eyes met in a long, unblinking stare. Then Gon said, “Anything, Killua. I already told you that. And you should have known that without me saying.”

 Killua’s eyes flickered away again from the stark intensity of Gon’s. “All right, then,” he said, “show me the math that you’re whining about.”

 “Whining!” Gon whined loudly. “I was not – ” Killua leveled him with a glower softened by a half-smile. Gon sighed. “Fine,” he said, going to retrieve the paper and a new pencil from the table. “I hope you know all about sines and cosines, because it all makes my head spin.”

 Killua shrugged. “I’ve learned one or two things since the last time I saw you.” Gon proceeded to watch glumly as Killua finished all of his homework in ten minutes.

 

*

 

Mito cried out when she saw Killua in her kitchen, sautéing vegetables with one hand tucked in his shorts pocket. She pulled him into a warm embrace while Abe laughed a toothless laugh, muttering, “I knew he’d come back. No one ever visits Whale Island and doesn’t come back!”

 Killua accepted their warm welcome graciously, even if he did blush up to his ears again at the open affection. But when Mito asked to what they owed the pleasure, Killua looked hopelessly at Gon, who was trying to make a salad without mangling the ingredients too much. At Killua’s look, he almost sliced into his thumb, only barely avoiding it when Mito pulled the knife from his hand at the last minute.

“Never mind!” Mito said brightly, continuing to chop the vegetables, nudging Gon out of the way while Abe laughed soundlessly behind her hand. “We’re just so glad to see you!”

Gon, meanwhile, had taken a fish from the many in the fridge, and begun slicing it carefully into fillets. But when he glanced up to see Killua’s dubious look, he stopped. “Oh, Killua – you hate fish, don’t you?”

 “I, um, no, it’s fine – ” Killua began, but Gon ignored him, and poked around the freezer until he found a massive steak, which he handed to Killua triumphantly.

 “You like steak, right?” he demanded.

 “Ah, yes, but – ” Killua began, looking at the hunk of frozen meat in distress.

 Mito took it from him gracefully. “Sit down, Killua. You’re a guest.” She filled a bowl with hot water and put the meat in it to thaw, and Killua sat.

 “Thank you,” he said to Gon’s relatives. “Sorry to drop in like this.”

Mito studied him for a moment. “So, will you be taking Gon away before he finishes school?” she asked in a carefully neutral tone.

Once again, Killua blushed to the roots of his hair. “Ah…no, Mito-san. I’ve told Gon that I’ll help him with his exams.”

Mito raised her eyebrows. “And then?”

Killua met her eyes squarely. “Well, then it’s up to Gon, isn’t it?”

For a moment, all of the eyes in the room were fixed on Gon. He looked away, his jaw working, and then he looked up at them all, his amber eyes blazing. “I’ll finish school, Mito-san. But then I’m going to go with Killua. He needs me.”

Mito gave both young men a hard look as she drained the bowl of water, and then she began to rub seasoning into the meat. “Do I want to know what for?”

Gon and Killua exchanged glances. It was Killua who answered, “It’s maybe better if you didn’t.”

Mito sighed and nodded, and then put the steak aside and washed her hands. “Well, boys, I bought this to celebrate Gon’s graduation. I think, though, having Killua back is occasion enough.”

She dried her hands and then reached into a cupboard, and brought out a bottle of a rare and expensive liquor, made from the nectar of a flower that grew only on Whale Island. She cut the wires over the cork with a sharp knife, and then took out four glasses that had lived at the top of the cupboard for as long as Gon could remember. They were beautiful, each one a different, deep jewel color, with facets that flashed light. Mito wiped each one carefully and then filled them with a measure of the pale liquid.

She handed them around, and then said, “To Killua’s return. And Gon’s future.” There was a hitch in her voice as she said the last words, but then she tossed back the glass with the nonchalance of the sailors at the port bars. Abe cackled, and swallowed hers almost as quickly, and then Gon and Killua downed theirs. Gon managed not to choke on the burning liquid, but Killua, to Gon’s secret delight, coughed heartily after he swallowed, his eyes watering.

“I thought you were immune to _all_ poisons, Killua,” Gon said with a laugh.

Killua, with cheeks flushed crimson, glared at him. “That doesn’t mean they’re any easier to swallow,” he croaked out. “Not,” he said quickly to Mito, “that I consider this poison.” Gon and his family laughed as Mito refilled their glasses, and Killua went to slide the steak into a frying pan.

 

*

 

For hours after dinner, Killua regaled Mito and Abe with stories of his travels around the world while they drank. Gon looked on, sipping from his ruby-red glass, now on its third refill, a question in his eyes. Killua thought that he knew what it meant: how could he carry on with small talk and alcohol when his heart was clearly smarting, longing for his sister? Killua didn’t know; he only knew that he couldn’t turn Gon’s family against him, if he hoped for Gon’s help.

At last, Mito saw Abe drowsing in her chair and took her off to bed, bidding goodnight to the boys at the same time. They sat up for a while, listening to the wind as it rose around the house, promising a sea-storm. Mito had left the bottle of liquor on the coffee table, and without either of them speaking it, it had become a competition for Gon and Killua to finish it.

Both of them tried to pretend that they weren’t tipsy, as they drank more and more. Even Killua had to admit to himself that he was feeling the effects, though not, apparently, as much as Gon, who was flushed crimson, his eyes glassy.

At last, Gon asked, “What do you want, Killua? For me to throw up first?”

Immediately, Killua’s smirk leveled. “You’re going to throw up?”

Gon sighed, put his glass aside. “I don’t know. I’ve never drunk this much before.”

Killua rolled his eyes, and set his own glass on the table. “Come on, Gon. We’re done.”

“But if you don’t want to stop – ”

“Gon! I am _not_ going to let you make yourself sick trying to keep up with me! Because you can’t.”

Gon frowned, his lower lip slipping into a pout that Killua thought he would have long since outgrown. It was silly, had been childish even when they were twelve, but it also made his stomach do a small flip that had nothing to do with the potent liquor. It wasn’t the first time that evening that it had happened, either, and it was entirely disconcerting.

Despite knowing that he was now nineteen, all the way to Whale Island Killua had been picturing Gon as a child. When the door opened on a handsome man – more than handsome, if he was honest with himself – he’d been stunned. Gon’s face had lengthened and narrowed, his body grown powerful as his early strength had promised, but his eyes were still warm, honey-brown, and oddly innocent. Something in Killua had melted at the sight of him – that, as much as Alluka, had been the reason for his tears – and it still hadn’t re-formed.

“I can keep up with you, Killua!” Gon was complaining when Killua reined in his thoughts.

Killua went to the kitchen, filled two glasses with water and brought them back to the sitting room. Gon grudgingly took the one Killua offered him, and only began to sip it when Killua did the same. After Gon swallowed half of the water, Killua said, “Go to bed, Gon. In the morning you better be ready to learn trigonometry, or else get your ass kicked.”

“Only if you come too.”

“No. I’ll sleep here.”

Gon clattered his glass onto the coffee table. “What? No! You are _not_ going to sleep in the living room!”

Killua ran a hand over his face, and when he looked back at Gon, his exhaustion caught up with him all at once. “Yes, I am. I’m not going to intrude on your family any more than I already have.”

But now Gon was riled. “No, Killua! I can guess what you went through to get here. You’re sleeping in my bed, and that’s it.”

“What?” Killua asked, suddenly uncertain, and blushing (to his fury).

“Don’t be an idiot!” Gon snapped, shocking Killua so much that he stepped back. “You can have my bed, and I’ll sleep on the futon. If we’re going to find your sister, then we both need to be rested.”

Killua wanted to argue, but all at once, the fight left him. He thought of Alluka’s blue, blue eyes. He thought of all the times she had urged him to go back to Gon, and how cruel it was that she should get her wish like this. Sighing, he said, “All right. But only for tonight.”

Gon gave a quick nod, and then grabbed Killua’s hand, dragging him off the couch. Killua rolled his eyes but allowed himself to be pulled upstairs to Gon’s bedroom, where Gon left him to search out a spare toothbrush.

Though it had been many years since Killua had been there, very little had changed. There was the desk with a few framed pictures (including the picture that Gon and Killua and Alluka had taken by the World Tree before they parted), a chair piled with shucked clothing, and the futon that Mito must have made up for him on the floor. The only thing that was different was the bed: the narrow child’s bed was gone, replaced by one that suited the man’s frame Gon had grown into. But the timeworn quilts were the same. Killua sat down on the edge of the bed, stroking his hand across the soft, sun-faded fabric.

“Here,” Gon said as he came back from the bathroom, holding a towel and a new toothbrush for his friend.

“Thank you,” Killua said, accepting them.

“You can take a bath if you want to.”

“No. I’d wake up your family. I’ll do it in the morning.“

“You didn’t bring anything, did you?”

“I didn’t,” Killua admitted, his voice dismal. “When I found Alluka gone, I only stopped long enough to grab some money and my license.”

Gon nodded and moved to the dresser, opening drawers and pulling out clothing, which he handed to Killua. Killua took the pile and headed to the bathroom to brush his teeth and change. When he returned to the room it was dark, except for the scatters of moonlight that slipped through the wind-driven clouds. He laid his dirty clothes on the chair along with Gon’s, and then made his way to the bed. Gon’s eyes were wide open where he lay on his pillow on the floor, watching Killua approach.

There it was again – that awareness that something had changed profoundly in his feelings for his old friend. Killua tried to drive it downward, to bury it, but it nipped at his consciousness like a terrier at a child’s heels. Killua sighed and sat down on the edge of the bed again, facing Gon, who was still watching him.

“What is it?” he asked.

“I…I just can’t believe that you’re really here.”

Killua lifted the blankets on the bed and crawled under them, pulling them up to his chin against the draft from the window. “Well I’m here,” he said. “And I apologize.”

Without pause, Gon said, “What for?”

Killua considered this, and then he said, “Are you even worried about going after Illumi?”

“No,” Gon said without hesitation. “Why would I be worried? We’ve always beat everyone. This won’t be any different.”

Killua realized he should have expected this unquestioning optimism. He sighed again, laying an arm over his eyes. “It _will_ be different, Gon. With my father gone…well, who knows what Illumi’s planning?”

Gon curled his legs up to his chest. “Who cares? He’s always planning something, and you’ve gotten Alluka away from him before.”

It was a long time before Killua answered. Finally, softly, he said, “I know. But that was before she knew nen.” And then Killua turned over, his back to Gon, indicating that the conversation was finished.

 

3

 

Gon didn’t know how long he blinked into the darkness. It could have been seconds, or minutes, or hours. Yet when he looked up at Killua again, the drift of flickering, cloudridden moonlight across his quilted back hadn’t much changed. And _everything_ had changed. Alluka knew nen? That could only mean that Killua had taught her.

At last, unbearably restless, he sat up on the futon. A moment later, Killua sat up too. They faced each other across the few feet of darkness that separated them. “You taught your sister to use nen?” Gon asked at last, his voice sounding strange in his own ears.

“Of course I did!” Killua snapped. “How else was I supposed to keep her safe from Illumi…or the world safe from the two of them if he caught us?”

Gon considered his answer carefully, given Killua’s response. “Well…then I guess that was a good thing. But if she knows nen, then why are you so worried about what Illumi might do to her?” As soon as he’d said the words, he wished he hadn’t. It was hardly surprising when Killua’s face set and his fists clenched.

“Because Illumi is stronger than Alluka is,” Killua grated out. “And because _my father is dead!_ Don’t you understand? The chain of command is broken, and I was meant to be the next link. Now Illumi has a chance to take that place instead.”

“But you didn’t want it, did you?”

“Of course I didn’t! That’s not the point. If Illumi took it on his own, I’d be throwing a party right now. But he means to take it up with Alluka under his control…shit, Gon, you _know_ what Alluka and Nanika could do as children. Well, now it’s different. Stronger. And potentially so much worse.”

Gon leaned his chin on his arm, resting on his bent knee. But when he saw how Killua looked at him then – his face a bitter twist – he remembered what this pose must mean to him, and quickly shifted. It was too late, though. He could see the wetness in Killua’s eyes, bright in the broken moonlight, and Gon’s heart broke too – not for the first time or, he suspected, the last. But right now he could at least try to make it better.

“Killua,” he said, his voice low, almost a whisper. At first, his friend didn’t seem to hear him, only pressed his face into his raised knees. Once again, Gon said, “Killua.”

This time, Killua looked up. His eyes were black in the dark room, but the moisture hovering in them gleamed silver. Gon thought of the words Palm had spoken to him two years ago, when Killua had finally stopped writing altogether after months of emails that had grown ever more distant, and he’d called her in despair.

“I don’t know, Gon,” she’d said. “Sometimes friends grow apart. And he has so much on his plate, with his sister and her treatments.”

“I know,” Gon had said, “but I can’t help being afraid that it’s because of what happened.”

Palm had sighed. “I can’t promise you that it isn’t,” she’d told him, trying to be gentle, but there really was no gentle way to speak that truth.

“How bad was it?” Gon had asked - something he’d never been able to bring himself to ask her before. “For him, I mean?”

“It was bad, Gon. You were his best friend and he couldn’t help you. I’ve never seen anyone cry like he did when he realized that. He thought he’d failed you. He blamed himself, and I’m not sure he’s ever forgiven himself.”

Now Killua was blaming himself again, for whatever had happened to his sister – Killua, who had never done anything but try to save the people he loved the most. Killua, who had dragged his sister out of a dungeon and his best friend back from the edge of death.

Gon drew a deep breath, and then he said, “Come here.”

Killua looked up at him for a few long moments, and then he looked away, pressing his face back into his updrawn knees.

“Killua,” Gon said, drawing the name out into a plea.

Still, Killua didn’t look up. And so Gon threw back his covers, and settled himself on the bed beside his friend. “It isn’t your fault,” he said, at which Killua uttered a choked denial. “Killua,” he said, reaching a tentative hand towards him, and after a gut-wrenching moment of indecision, using a finger to lift his chin.

Gon had thought that Killua would pull away, but he didn’t, and in some ways the result was worse. Wide, wet, hopeless eyes met his own, and Gon said the only thing he could: “We’ll find her. We _will_ find her.”

Killua’s eyes gripped his. Gon couldn’t look away, and if Killua wanted to, he didn’t show it. “Gon,” he said at last, his voice a broken whisper. “I’m afraid.”

“I know you are,” Gon said, his warm hand creeping into Killua’s cold one. Once again, he expected Killua to pull back; once again, Killua held on instead, as if he were drowning and Gon was salvation. “But Killua, there’s nothing we can do about it right now.” He looked into his friend’s face. “How long is it since you’ve slept?”

“I don’t know,” Killua answered miserably. “Mostly, I just ran.”

“Lie down,” he said softly, reaching into his friend’s silvery hair to stroke it as Killua obeyed. “It will be okay. I promise, it will be okay…” And although he didn’t know that it would be, when Gon got under the covers and curled himself around Killua’s slender body, and Killua let him, both of them believed it. They believed it enough, anyway, to finally fall asleep.

 


	2. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the former Republic of East Gorteau, Illumi attempts to get the better of Alluka and Nanika, while on Whale Island Gon battles advanced math and some rather confusing feelings regarding her erstwhile best friend...

**Former Republic of East Gorteau**

1

 

“It’s very simple, Alluka,” Illumi said, dangling the pill bottle from his long fingers, just out of Alluka’s reach – if she had been inclined to reach for it, which she wasn’t. “Let me talk to Nanika, and I’ll give you today’s dose.”

Leaning against the dusty stone wall of the tower, knees drawn up to her chest, Alluka looked past her oldest brother. Her gaze rested just beyond his right shoulder, on the room’s single, small, barred window. There was nothing to see through its arch but blue sky with a few wisps of cloud, but that was infinitely preferable to Illumi’s bog-black eyes. She wasn’t avoiding them out of anger at him, or even any particular fear – only mundane disgust. The fact was, she’d lived so long with the knowledge that he would come for her one day, that it was almost a relief not to have to anticipate it anymore.

It didn’t make her feel any better, however, about how spectacularly he’d caught her off guard. Of course, Illumi’s zetsu was very good – even Killua hadn’t sensed him in the vicinity – and he had timed his arrival perfectly. Killua had gone out earlier to buy food, and Illumi had come into the house fifteen minutes later, full of enough needles to look like his younger brother, with a story about having forgotten his money. He’d convinced Alluka to come with him when he went back out, and by the time she noticed him acting strangely, it was far too late to get away. At least she’d realized the truth in time to fight him off when he tried to put one of his needles in her head. But she hadn’t been able to escape him entirely.

For the first few hours after he’d kidnapped her, her main preoccupation had been why he had taken only her, and not Killua too. Thinking about it on the long, silent ride on the airship – empty, as far as she could tell, except for the two of them and the pilot – she’d come to the only logical conclusion out of the many she’d considered. Illumi had learned about what she and Nanika could do, and he planned to take control of Nanika himself.

But it didn’t quite ring true. If that were the case, why hadn’t he tried to draw her out on the airship? And if he didn’t know her secret, then why choose now to kidnap her?

The puzzle pieces had finally come together when, after torturous hours she’d long stopped counting, Illumi had dragged her up the stairs of the tower in this abandoned castle in some tropical climate, removed her blindfold, and informed her in a low, passionless voice that their father was dead. She hadn’t needed to ask for clarification: there was an opening at the top of their family’s stringent hierarchy, and Illumi meant to claim it.

It had been obvious to Alluka for as long as she’d been aware of the workings of their family that Illumi resented Killua’s status as the chosen one. It had surprised her to realize that no one else seemed to see through Illumi’s elaborate charade of obedience and supposed love for Killua. But this kidnapping proved it: Illumi wanted everything that Killua had had, including control of Nanika’s power. This was the third day in a row that he’d taunted her with the medication. Clearly, he believed that he would be able to wear Alluka down enough by withholding it that she would give up the secret to Killua’s free wishes.

As usual, he had vastly underestimated her. She would die before she gave up _that_ secret.

“Are you listening to me, Alluka?” Illumi asked, the barest hint of impatience creeping into his otherwise well-controlled voice.

“Yes, I’m listening to you, Illumi,” she said with weary calm. “But I have nothing to say.”

He cocked his head, his black eyes boring into hers. “You understand what will happen if you stop taking your medication, don’t you?”

In fact, she knew exactly what would happen: nothing. Killua had convinced her after she finished her surgeries and they left Yorkshin that her hormonal medication should come in the form of a subdermal implant. At first she’d been uncertain: the technology was very new, and she didn’t love the idea of plastic under her skin, releasing drugs, which might malfunction at any time. But he had wanted them to be able to travel freely, without worrying about constant access to pills or injections, and in the end she’d agreed.

Apparently, however, Illumi hadn’t uncovered this piece of information, and that could work to her advantage. If he believed that refusing the hormones was weakening her psychologically and undoing her physically, he might let his guard down long enough for her to escape. So she met his eyes, although she hated to. It was like surrendering to black quicksand. She hoped that her defiance hid her fear when she said, “Of course I know what will happen. And none of it – _none of it –_ would be as awful as being your pawn.”

Illumi raised his eyebrows, his lips thinning. “I see that our brother’s delightful personality has been rubbing off on you.”

Alluka had to smile. “If you mean that I don’t cower in your presence anymore, then you’re right.”    

Illumi held her for another moment in his lifeless gaze, and then he pocketed the pills. “Have it your way, then. But you aren’t going to win this, little brother.”

Alluka refused to rise to the bait, smiling sweetly at Illumi when she wanted to snarl. “I don’t need to win anything, Illumi. I only need not to lose.”

 

2

 

Alluka woke to Nanika’s cold fingers stroking her cheek, her eyes snapping open instantly. Nanika was in her human shape, the one she usually took when there was a fight impending. Alluka was instantly alert, ready to re-absorb her other half before Illumi could see them separated like this. _What is it?_ she asked.

Nanika turned to her, her only facial features – two bright, gas-blue spots where a human’s eyes would be – burning into Alluka. _Someone’s outside the door. Not Illumi._

 _Get back in,_ Alluka said, and as Nanika dipped her head in a curt nod, Alluka braced herself for the still-strange feeling of re-absorbing her. It was cold, damp, like a fog that passed through the cells of her body and settled into the spaces between them. Not painful, not entirely pleasant. But they had practiced this enough by now to be able to do it with minimal recovery time, so when the door opened Alluka was on her feet, ren at full force.

Given the situation, she would have called on it no matter who was behind the door. As it happened, though, whoever it was had their own ren cranked full-throttle. Alluka braced to defend herself, hoping that Killua had taught her enough to win whatever fight might be coming.

When the creaking door finally swung open, though, shock almost made her lose hold of her aura completely. She had been correct in her assumption that it wasn’t Illumi behind the door, but nor was it any of the nen-drenched monsters she’d been imagining. Instead it was a young man, maybe a couple of years older than she was, with long, dark-blond hair pulled back into a messy ponytail, a longish face with a slightly crooked nose, and terrified green eyes. He carried a tray of food. There was a magpie perched on his shoulder, staring at her through the burnished lashings of the young man’s ren.

“Who are you?” Alluka demanded.

The boy stopped dead in the doorway, his ren flickering as he clearly struggled to control it. Then it surged again brightly. Alluka narrowed her eyes. He clearly didn’t have much training, and he wouldn’t be able to sustain this for long – so why was he trying? What, she wondered, had Illumi told him about her?

“Illumi told me his brother was in this room,” the boy blurted as if he’d heard her thought, setting the tray down on the floor, never taking his wary eyes off of Alluka.

Well, really, she should have guessed that. “Illumi, you’ll learn soon enough, really isn’t someone whose word you should depend on,” she said dryly.

The boy tried for bravado when he said, “Illumi pays me. I’ll believe what he says.”

Alluka rolled her eyes. “It’s your funeral.”

The boy was already backing out the door, but he stopped at that, looking as if he meant to say something else. Then he turned and fled, dragging the door shut and locking it. Sighing, Alluka went to inspect the tray.

**Whale Island**

**Wednesday**

1

 

Gon woke to warm limbs tangled with his. His eyes flew open in a moment of disoriented astonishment, and then he saw the shock of white hair, felt the face buried into his chest, and he remembered it all. His body relaxed and his arm tightened around Killua’s shoulders, and he smiled to himself, despite everything. Because Killua was back. Killua was _here;_ so close that he couldn’t pull away again without Gon stopping him. And nen or not, Gon had no doubt that he could stop him.

Gon closed his eyes again, tucked his legs under Killua’s until they were curled into a ball under the covers. Killua’s hand slipped up under Gon’s shirt to rest over his heart, and as surprised as Gon was, he made himself stay relaxed. Reacting the wrong way to the gesture was exactly the kind of thing that would scare Killua away.

And anyway, it wasn’t as if he hadn’t thought about it. The way he had felt about this man when they were children had grown and changed, but also become clearer in the time they had been separated. He knew that it wasn’t exactly friendship anymore, though he had never tried to pin it down with a name. What was the point, he’d reasoned, when he might never see Killua again?

But now Killua was here, pressed against him, and he had to wonder whether it had been the same for Killua, too, whether Killua felt what he was feeling… _Stop it!_ Gon told himself as his breaths grew shallow and his heart started to beat faster. And then Killua stirred, tilted his head up, staring at him for a suspended moment before he snatched his hand back and sat up abruptly.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, crimson-cheeked.

“Why?” Gon asked softly.

“I didn’t mean to…” He stopped, flushing more deeply, and turned his head away. “Never mind. Want to use the bathroom first?”

Gon blinked at him, trying to make his brain work through the warm fuzz that had grown there when Killua’s hand crept up his chest. “Um…yeah. Okay.” Reluctantly, he climbed out of bed. And then he looked down, saw his tented boxers, and ran to the bathroom before Killua could see them too.

When he returned, he’d just about regained his equilibrium (and put on a full set of clothes) until he saw Killua sitting up in bed, with the drawer of the bedside table wide open. Then he wanted to run back to the bathroom, or sink into the ground. But it was too late for one, and the other was impossible.

Killua looked up at him with narrowed eyes, yet Gon could see a swarm of questions behind them, and something else – anger? It made him want to snatch what Killua was holding out of his hand. “So,” Killua said evenly, holding out two handfuls of condoms to Gon, “are you running a business I should invest in?”

Gon’s face burned, but he made himself walk to Killua, take the packages out of his hands, return them to the drawer, and shut it forcefully. “I’m not running a business, Killua.”

Killua cocked an eyebrow, and smirked. “You’re just that popular?”

Gon didn’t think his face could burn more than it already was, but he was wrong. “In the summertime,” he said, sighing, “cruise ships stop here. Girls ask me out. Aunt Mito is afraid that I’ll catch some disease from them if I have sex with them, and so she keeps giving me those…” He gestured to the drawer.

Killua ran his hand through his rumpled hair; now it was his turn to flush. “Wow, so you really _are_ that popular.” He was trying for sarcasm, but didn’t quite make it.

Gon’s eyes flashed up to Killua’s, wide and pleading. “No, I’m not! Well…I mean, I’ve gone on a lot of dates, but those girls, they’re mostly annoying. I’ve only slept with three of them in all of this time…”

“Only three?” Killua asked. He appeared to be enjoying the sight of Gon embarrassed, despite everything.

“Why are you asking me this?” Gon cried, his face hot. “And besides, _you’ve_ had sex before, too!”

“What?” Killua gulped, his own blush exploding across his cheeks.

Gon shrugged, smirking now that the shoe was on the other foot. “You’ve had sex. With girls, and boys too.”

“How do you know that?” Killua demanded, his voice choked.

Gon looked at him steadily. “I just know, kind of like how I know a storm is coming. It’s like a smell, only not.”

“Okay, that’s way more than I needed to – ”

“One girl, and two boys,” Gon plowed on, ignoring him. “Three. Same as me. Only I haven’t had sex with any boys. Well, not yet. I mean there were some who asked, but – ”

Killua’s head was almost in his lap, his ears crimson. “Gon.”

“Yes?” Gon asked brightly.

“Can you just stop talking?”

Gon studied Killua’s bent head. “All right. But you’re the one who started it.”

Killua held up a hand. “Guilty as charged. Now go study, and let’s pretend this conversation never happened.”

Gon was silent for a moment, and then laughter burst out of him. Killua looked up at him, eyes wide with surprise, and Gon couldn’t help diving at him, wrapping him in his arms. He still couldn’t quite believe that Killua was real. The force was enough to throw Killua back onto the pillows, and he glared at Gon.

“There’s nothing funny about any of this, Gon,” he said, trying to sound stern. “We need to be thinking of a plan to find Alluka, not comparing our sex lives.”

“I know that,” Gon said more seriously, his arms propped on either side of Killua’s face as he looked down at him. Killua’s eyes were wide as tide pools, and swimming with emotion. Gon couldn’t help wondering what it was that he was feeling; whether he had provoked it. He also knew better than to ask. “But we can’t do that until Friday. And until Friday, I don’t want to do anything but remember you.”

Killua blinked up at him, then bit his lip. They were breathing each other’s breath, and Gon’s heart beat too fast, but he could feel that Killua’s did, too. Killua’s eyes began to soften – and then Mito’s voice sang through the door: “Boys, breakfast!”

The two of them looked at each other for a moment longer. Then Gon closed his eyes, sighed, and pushed himself up off of the bed. “You can go back to sleep, Killua,” he said. “I know you’re still tired. I’ll wake you up in a few hours.”

“No. We have to get to your schoolwork – ”

“Today’s assignment won’t come for another hour.”

Killua gazed at Gon for a moment more, his eyes unreadable. Then he pulled the covers up to his ear. “Okay,” he said, turning over. “One hour. No more…” His voice was drowsy, dreamy.

“Of course,” Gon said softly. “Sleep well, friend.” Tentatively, he smoothed Killua’s hair back from his temple. But he was already asleep.

 

2

 

Killua woke again around noon. It had been years since he’d slept so late, and he was disgusted with himself, and furious at Gon for not waking him earlier. At the same time, Gon’s bed was so very difficult to leave, even if Gon had long since vacated it. It was soft, and wide, and the covers smelled like… _like home,_ his brain supplied as he breathed into the wash-worn sheets. Immediately, he tried to dispel the thought. He couldn’t think about such trivial things, given how much was on the line. He pulled himself out of bed.

The sun, now at its apex, no longer shone through the windows of Gon’s bedroom, but he could still feel its heat baked into the hardwood floorboards beneath his feet, and in the air when he breathed it. It felt like the gentle mother’s touch he had always imagined, but never known. Sighing, he looked toward the chair where he had left his clothes the night before. They were gone, along with Gon’s. In their place was a new pile of clean clothes, neatly folded.

He walked over to them, picking up the sage-green t-shirt at the top. For a moment he simply held it, rubbing the soft cotton gently between his fingers. And then, knowing that he should know better, he buried his face in it. Clearly it had been washed well – he smelled soap scented with lavender and rosemary, salt wind, sun. But that couldn’t entirely erase Gon’s scent of trees and grass and wood smoke. They were more potent than the rest, plunging straight to Killua’s heart. He sank down on the chair, dizzy, breathing in the scent of the fabric again and again, until he heard a soft knock at the door. Then, he flung the shirt back into the pile and practically ran to open it.

He found Mito on the other side. “I hope I didn’t wake you, Killua,” she said in her gentle way. And yet, her look was full of waiting words.

“No, Mito,” he said. “I was already awake. I was just…” He realized that he had no way to end the sentence that wouldn’t be mortifying for them both, and so he just stood there, feeling idiotic in the warmth of Mito’s smile.

“Well,” she said, “there’s breakfast in the kitchen for you. I only came to tell you that I’m taking Abe out for a walk, and I sent Gon to get groceries, and to help yourself.”

Killua worked to hide his annoyance with this – first Gon failed to wake him up on time, and now he seemed to be avoiding schoolwork.

But Mito laughed at his expression. “Don’t worry, he’s been working on his math all morning. I made him go out – he looked like he was ready to explode. He’ll be back soon.”

He expected her to leave then, and let him go about his business, but instead, Mito leaned against the doorframe. “Killua,” she said at last, hesitantly, “I would never want you to think that you aren’t welcome here.”

He drew a deep breath, and sighed it out. “Where’s the ‘but’?”

She smiled slightly. “There’s a rather large ‘but,’ which has been bothering me since I first saw you in my kitchen yesterday. I know that you came back because you needed Gon to help you with something very important to you. And I would never come between the two of you, especially on such a matter.”

Killua laughed joylessly, already knowing where this was going. “But?”

“But,” Mito answered, the smile gone, “do you have any idea what you did to him?”

Killua didn’t mean to, but he couldn’t help snapping, “Do you mean saving his life?”

Mito sighed, her hazel eyes closing for a moment. “Of course not! I’ve heard that whole story, Killua – at least, as much of it as Gon remembers. I know that he was injured, and that you and your sister are the reason why he made it home alive. For me, that ought to be the end of it…but it isn’t. Because ever since you stopped writing to him, nothing has been right.”

“I – ” Killua began, and then stopped, wondering how much she really knew. And of course, she couldn’t know why he’d stopped writing when he barely knew it himself.

Mito met his intense eyes with her own. “I doubt that there’s anyone on earth who knows Gon as well as you and I do. And I do know all of it, Killua: that he sacrificed himself for Kite. That he was dying. That he lost something special when you and your sister brought him back to life. I also know that it was something not many people ever experience. You call it ‘nen,’ don’t you?”

“He told you about nen?” Killua asked incredulously.

“Of course not. That would have been breaking a vow, and you know that that’s something Gon would never do. But that doesn’t mean the information isn’t available, if one is determined to find it.”

Killua had to smile. He didn’t think he’d ever met anyone as determined as Gon’s adopted mother was, except Gon himself. Still: “I didn’t think that Gon even really knew the details of how…he came back. Or what he came back from.”

Mito sighed. “He doesn’t. What I know, I learned from talking to his friend Palm.”

“She’s been here?” Killua demanded, jealousy clouding his brain like a swarm of hornets.

“Three times, since Gon came home,” Mito confirmed.

“ _Three_ times?” Killua practically choked.

Mito laughed heartily, her eyes closing into half-moons of chestnut eyelashes. “Don’t worry, Killua. She wasn’t one of his conquests.”

Killua spluttered, “Is everyone in this family pathologically honest?”

Mito only shrugged, still smiling. “We islanders tend to be direct. In a place this small, there’s really no point in hiding anything. Anyway, Palm is lovely, and she is a good friend to Gon. But there’s nothing between them other than friendship. Which is the point I came to make.” All at once, her gaze was fierce – the kind of look Killua had only seen in creatures protecting their young. Eagles. Mountain cats.

“Um…” he said, helplessly.

“Killua, Gon loves you,” Mito said simply, but with the unremitting force of an ocean tide. “I’ve known that since I first saw you together, when you were children.”

“I…I…” he stammered again, blushing for at least the fifth time that morning.

“I’m not here to make you confess anything,” Mito said. “All I know is that it broke his heart when you stopped writing to him. I don’t know the ins and outs of that, but I do know that he still carries the scars. So please, if you’re back, be sure you’re back to stay with him, by whatever means you two agree on. Otherwise, it would be kinder to leave him now, before he can hope for anything more.”

There was a moment’s pause. Then Killua began, “Mito-san, I have no intention of – ”

“I know that you don’t,” she said softly, sadly. “But that doesn’t mean you won’t. And if you hurt him again, Killua…well, you’ll have me to answer to. You may be powerful, maybe more powerful than most creatures on this earth, but I don’t think you’ve ever come up against a mother’s love.”

Killua gulped audibly. “Okay,” he said, barely above a whisper.

“I’m glad that we understand each other,” Mito said briskly. “Now, wash off the travel dirt and come eat something. I’m sure Gon will be ready to study when he returns.”

 

3

 

Gon was willing, and he was trying: Killua had to give him that. However, it had also become very clear, very quickly, that Gon still had no head for math. Killua explained the problems they were working on as patiently as he could, but Gon was terminally distracted, looking out the window at the cloudblown day, the play of light and shadow as the sun flickered on the silver sea far below. He had the same look on his face that he’d had as a child when a new adventure beckoned. He also seemed to have a penchant for breaking pencils.

“Gon,” Killua said wearily, recalling his attention for the tenth time in an hour.

“Oh…sorry, Killua,” Gon said sheepishly. “What were you saying?”

Killua deadpanned, “X plus Y times the square root of infinity equals I will kick your sorry ass from here to Yorkshin if you don’t finish this worksheet in the next ten minutes!”

Gon promptly broke another pencil.

Killua sighed. “Okay, Gon. Five minute break. You get to say whatever you want, and I will not call you on your lack of verbal filter. Or tell Mito-san the three swears that you know.”

Gon looked at Killua and quirked a smile. “How about an ask?”

Killua rolled his eyes. “Fine. Whatever. Not promising to answer, though.”

“I only want to know how you know all of this stuff.” Gon gestured to the sheet of equations. “I mean I know you’re really smart, Killua, but things like math don’t just show up in your head, do they?”

Killua smiled. “Unfortunately for both of us, no, they don’t.”

“So…?”

Killua shrugged. “I learned it in school, like everyone else.”

Gon’s brow furrowed. “School? What school?”

“A boarding school. One that took Alluka and me with no questions asked. Well, no questions once I paid double the tuition. We both finished high school last year.”

Gon was gazing at Killua in much the same way that he gazed at the math problems. “But…your family…?”

“Money buys silence, Gon. Besides, it was the kind of school that knows how to keep secrets. The kind where the high and mighty send their kids.”

Gon considered this, and then he asked the last thing Killua had been expecting. “Did you like being a normal kid?”

Killua had to laugh at that. “Gon, I have never been a normal kid.”

Gon cocked his head. “What do you mean?”

“Just that. I’ve never felt normal, and I’ve never felt like a kid. I mean honestly, have you? At least since you became a Hunter?”

Gon studied him in silence for a moment, and Killua felt his heartbeat speed up and his throat tighten, though he wasn’t sure whether it was with anxiety about whatever Gon would say next, or something else. “Has it been five minutes yet?” Gon asked.

Killua raised his eyebrows. “Depends on whether you’re done with the interrogation.”

Gon played with the two pieces of his broken pencil, a tinge of a flush coloring his cheeks. “Did you stop writing to me because of them? I mean, those two boys and a girl you had s – ”

“I know what you meant!” Killua said quickly, along with a mental, _fuck._ This was exactly the question he had not wanted to hear. Still, he’d known it was coming, if not quite so soon. But he respected Gon too much – and frankly, he owed him too much – to lie, or refuse to answer.

Killua drew a deep breath, and picked up another of Gon’s broken pencils, sent tiny crackles of blue electricity zinging along it. “Partly.” Gon was biting his lip when Killua looked up, his eyes wide and unblinking and so warm and open to hurt. “Gon,” he sighed, “it isn’t because I didn’t want you to know. And it isn’t…it isn’t because I was in love with them. Because I wasn’t. Not with any of them.”

Two boys and a girl. How had Gon known, Killua wondered? The first boy had been a mutual crush at that elite school, but it had fizzled for both of them after a few months’ pandering to lust led to no real feelings beyond that. The girl had been an experiment, to see whether it felt the same. Felt as good. It hadn’t. They’d parted on amicable terms. The third boy – a man, really, though a very young one – had been a few days’ fling between Yorkshin and Lukso Province, and had convinced Killua that women weren’t what he wanted.

“Then why did you stop writing?”

“What?” Killua asked, returning, startled, to the present. “Oh. I…shit, Gon, I’m not sure I even really know. I just…didn’t know how to tell you.”

Gon’s look of consternation had deepened. “Do you think that I would have been mad at you?”

Killua shrugged, feeling far, far out of his depth. “No. I mean, maybe I thought about that, but it wasn’t why I didn’t tell you. Or why I stopped writing.” He dropped his face into his hands, rubbed it a couple of times, and then looked back up at Gon. “I just…I realized I wasn’t the person you left at the World Tree anymore. And I mean, I couldn’t…I didn’t know how to be…fuck, Gon, I’m sorry. I don’t know how to explain this!”

Gon looked thoughtful, leaving another silence that five years ago, he would have filled with words. But then again, Killua reminded himself, five years ago they wouldn’t have been having this conversation. And he wished to hell that they weren’t having it now, but of course, he had only himself to blame for that. The least he could do was see it through.

“You don’t have to,” Gon said at last.

“Yeah, actually, I think I do.”

But Gon was shaking his head. “I mean, you don’t have to explain it, because I understand. You thought I wouldn’t like who you’d turned into.”

Gon met his eyes again, held them, and Killua could do nothing but swallow hard. Because those tawny eyes were so beautiful. He had thought that they couldn’t be as beautiful as he remembered, but they were. Wide and wild and fiercely loyal, like the eyes of a half-tamed wolf. Killua gave a curt nod in response.

“Killua, why would you think that?”

Killua smiled bitterly. “I think your five minutes are up, Gon.”

“Killua.”

He was silent for a moment, and then he burst out, “Because I don’t even know if _I_ like who I’ve turned into!”

There was another, entirely un-Gon-like silence. At last he broke it, saying simply, “So far, you seem okay. You seem like _you_. But if you stop seeming like you, I’ll tell you.”

Killua had to laugh. “I guess that’s fair enough.”

“But you have to tell me, too.”

Killua rolled his eyes. “I’m the one who ditched you, Gon. You don’t owe me anything.”

Gon held his eyes, smiling a little, and it was a man’s smile, not a child’s: tinged with sadness and regret, bright as it was. “Don’t lie, Killua. You know what I owe you.”

“Just help me find Alluka. That will cancel out a lifetime of debts.”

“Speaking of that…”

“We should be speaking of pre-calculus.”

“I know, but just – I had this idea, earlier.” Gon’s eyes had brightened as they did when he was inspired.

“We’re never going to finish this math, are we?” Killua grumbled, but half-heartedly.

“I promise I will,” Gon said, his voice imploring, “but just listen first, okay? So – how were you thinking of tracking Alluka?”

Killua twitched his shoulders upward. “I was going to take you back to our house in Lukso and hope you could pick up a trail?”

Gon was already nodding. “That’s what I thought. But then I had a better idea.”

“Which is…?”

“Kurapika!”

Killua took a moment to digest this. Then he said, “I thought he went on that expedition to the Dark Continent.”

Gon’s excitement visibly dampened. “Yeah, he did. Leorio too. They got back about six months after you…ah, about two years ago. I guess you didn’t keep in touch with them either?”

Killua sighed. “No. I mean we talked for a while after… But then I knew that they were going somewhere. Neither of them would tell me where. Once the news came out about the expedition I figured it was the Dark Continent, but they were gone so long…well, we lost touch.”

Gon was studying him incisively again. “Well they live together, now. I mean they _are_ together.”

Killua raised his eyebrows. “And more power to them, but where are you going with this, Gon?”

“Oh, yeah, sorry…I just thought, well, Kurapika is good at divination, right?”

“I guess?”

“So wouldn’t it be a lot easier to get him to figure out where Alluka is, than for me to try to track her from your house?”

“Well, yeah, theoretically – _if_ she’s within his range. But that’s a pretty huge gamble. Illumi could have taken her anywhere. Maybe too far away from Kurapika for him to be able to tell.”

Gon shrugged. “Maybe. But maybe not. And the thing is, Killua – ” Gon drew a deep breath, then let it out again. “It’s been kind of a long time now. If we start from your house, I’m…well, I’m not sure there will be any scent left to track. Just let me call him. I know he’ll want to help.”

“Will he? I dropped out of his life.”

“Of course he will!” Gon cried, clearly incensed that Killua would question this. “He’s your friend! I mean, he went away too!”

Gon looked at Killua with wide, hopeful eyes, and Killua had the warring urges to shake or to hug him. He did neither, but he did finally say, “Okay, you can call him. _After_ we finish the math!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who's read and commented so far. Your comments and kudos mean so much to me, particularly as a new writer in this fandom. I'm up up to chat anytime! (Tumblr link is on chapter one...)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which, we explore just how twisted Illumi is, and how completely kick-ass Alluka is. Yep, it's pure Alluka this week. It's important. One could say the plot hinges on this chapter. But also I just love her, so I hope you love her too! And for those of you waiting for killugon smut, your patience will be rewarded next week. Promise! <3

 

**Former Republic of East Gorteau**

1

 

Illumi leaned against the metal door to the tower, arms crossed over his chest, impassive eyes fixed on Alluka. She stared back at him with equal expressionlessness – or so she hoped. “It will be so much easier if you just tell me,” he said.

 

“Easier for _you,_ yes,” she answered.

 

“Don’t underestimate how miserable I can make your life, little brother.”

 

Alluka shrugged, gloating a little bit internally. It had been days now since Illumi had locked her in this tower. He’d long since confirmed her guess that he wanted the secret to Killua’s free wishes, and she knew that it was maddening him that she kept refusing to tell him – and refusing the medication he offered.

 

“Really, Illumi – what are you going to do? Killing me defeats the purpose. Denying me hormones? Okay. Not the most fun, but it won’t be fatal. What’s left? Torture? Try that, and I guarantee that Nanika will never do anything for you.”

 

Illumi watched her for another long moment, and then he paced away from the door, toward the window, beyond which rain sheeted down, increasing the already substantial humidity. When he turned back to her, Alluka was sure that he was going to berate or cajole her. But instead he said, his voice conversational, almost sympathetic, “It can’t have been much of a life for you, these last few years. Running and hiding, never time to make friends, no one but our brother for company.”

 

Alluka rolled her eyes. “All _that_ tells me is that you really have no idea what we’ve been doing.”

 

Illumi shrugged. “That isn’t the point.”

 

“Which is…?”

 

“Is that what you want for the rest of your life? To spend it alone? Hiding?”

 

“That was never going to be the rest of my life.”

 

“Which is why our brother taught you to use nen, presumably. So that you could be independent.” He tilted his head, his strange, matte-black eyes heavy on her. “But it seems he failed. You both failed. Because if you were strong enough for that, you wouldn’t be here now. You’d have figured me out sooner, or fought me off when you did…but you couldn’t.”

 

 _Didn’t,_ she corrected him mentally. _Because I needed Nanika for that, and the chance of Nanika and I not besting you was too much of a chance to take._ “In which case,” she said out loud, “what good am I to you?”

 

“You have potential, Alluka. Immense potential, more even than Killua. I could teach you far more than he ever could. Together – ”

 

Alluka sighed. “Spare me, Illumi. You don’t want to teach me, or work together. You never cared about me before, and you don’t now. The only things you care about are that Father is dead, you think you’re the rightful heir to our illustrious dynasty, and you want Nanika to make you invincible. And it’s _not happening._ ”

 

Once again, Illumi was studying her as if she were a specimen under a microscope. At last, he said, “You aren’t stupid; I’ll give you that. But you’re also still very young, and rather naïve. That was one of Killua’s mistakes: sheltering you.”

 

Alluka wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of asking what that meant, although she could feel unease beginning to creep within her, and with it, the shift that came when she began to detach from Nanika. A shift that she still couldn’t entirely control. _Please, not now!_ she told her. She tried to keep her breathing even, to remember all of the lessons in meditation that Killua had made her practice before he even broached the topic of ten.

 

There were certainly assets to the two of them separating when it came to a fight, but it also left Nanika vulnerable in ways that Alluka and Killua were only beginning to understand. They’d studied the newest research on Ai to come from the Dark Continent, and the worst possibility was that while she was separate from Alluka, Nanika could be captured by or forced into another host, which would cause her to revert to her feral form. No doubt Illumi had read the same research; he might well know more than they did, given he’d been on the expedition. And so he couldn’t ever know that they could do this.

 

Illumi was smiling a slight, bland smile. “You mentioned torture. The thing is, Alluka, there are many kinds of torture, and no one is immune to them all. I can see that it would be fruitless to inflict physical pain on you. But what if it were something a bit closer to your heart?”

 

For the first time since he’d kidnapped her, Alluka felt a twinge of true fear.

 

“For example: how would it feel to watch Killua lose everyone he’s ever loved, and know that you were responsible?”

 

Forcing her voice to evenness, Alluka said, “What would _you_ know about love?”

 

Illumi raised his eyebrows. “Rather a lot, actually. After a friend suggested that I might have an imperfect understanding of the concept, I set myself a course of study.”

 

Alluka looked at him incredulously. “A course of study? How do you study love?” Love, to her, had always been intuitive. She loved Killua. She loved Nanika. She didn’t think that Illumi had ever truly loved anybody.

 

Illumi shrugged. “The way you study most things: books.”

 

“So what,” she asked, “you gave yourself a crash course on all the great love stories? ‘Romeo and Juliet’ and all that?”

 

“Of course not!” Illumi said with disgust. “Fiction is no more than opinion. I studied instructional texts.”

 

 _Instructional texts?_ Alluka thought, her face flushing with embarrassment and disgust. “Illumi - you read _sex books?”_

 

Illumi have her an incredulous look. “Sex is at its root a procreative act. What Killua appears to be engaged in with other men does not fall under this category. So, no. I read books detailing the stages of emotional attachment.”

 

 _Okay. Better than sex manuals, but…_ “You studied love in, what - self-help books?”

 

“It was the logical approach,” Illumi said without a shred of irony.

 

Alluka didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “Fine,” she said, mastering herself after a moment. “You understand love. You want to use Killua against me for emotional blackmail. But there are two problems with that: first you’ll have to find him. And then you’ll have to kill me, because there’s no one else he loves.”

 

Illumi’s smile widened, took on a savage cast. “Find him?” he repeated. “Alluka, you really are naïve! Do you think that he didn’t come sprinting after you the moment he realized I’d taken you?” He rolled his eyes at her expression. “Yes, Alluka – I made sure to leave him enough evidence to know that it was me. He’s already on his way here. And as for you being the only one he loves – are you certain of that?”

 

“It’s been just Killua and me for five years now,” Alluka said. “He hasn’t had a serious relationship in all that time.” But the fear was growing again and Nanika was stirring in a way that made her feel nauseous. She wasn’t going to be able to hold onto her for much longer.

 

“Mmm, but that wasn’t always the case, was it? There was someone he loved once at least as much as he loved you, given all the symptoms.”

 

“Symptoms?”

 

Illumi waved a dismissive hand. “I could list all of the ones Killua displayed in this particular instance, but really, everything else pales in comparison to the trouble he went to maneuvering you out of that dungeon to save someone who couldn’t otherwise be saved.” Illumi cocked an eyebrow. “So. Care to hazard a guess as to who he ran to when he found you missing?”

 

Alluka’s breath stuttered. _Oh, please, no…_

“Correct,” Illumi said, in a tone that was almost beatific. “Gon Freecss. The same Gon Freecss who lost his ability to use nen.”

 

“You don’t know that Gon hasn’t re-learned nen,” Alluka answered, trying to convince herself as much as Illumi.

 

“Of course I know that he hasn’t re-learned nen. Do you think that I didn’t keep tabs on him once I realized that Killua loved him, and how useful he might be in making Killua behave?”

 

Alluka gritted her teeth, unmoving, barely breathing. She knew where this was leading, and Nanika knew it too. She was crashing around inside of Alluka in her fury, and it was all Alluka could do to hold onto her. But she _had_ to hold on, if there was going to be any chance of thwarting her oldest brother’s monstrous plot.

 

“Any number of excellent Hunters at his disposal, and he chooses to bring a nenless failure with him on this quest for his lost pet,” Illumi mused. “That’s another symptom, by the way: temporary insanity. But, since it works in my favor, far be it from me to attempt to make our brother see reason.”

 

 _Nanika DON’T!_ Alluka wailed as her twin spun herself into a squall of blue and black emotion. For a moment she didn’t think that Nanika would listen to her, but then Nanika stilled.

 

Illumi stood in front of her now, only inches away, black eyes drilling into hers. “Because if someone were to threaten Gon’s life…well, I don’t think that Killua would be so hard to control then, would he?” He ran a cold finger down her cheek.

 

_And here it comes..._

 

“I hoped you’d prove to be as biddable as you used to be, little brother, but I was prepared for you to have absorbed some of our brother’s less desirable qualities. I had a number of other plans in place with that eventuality in mind, but Killua has chosen for me, and really, he couldn’t have chosen better.” He smiled. “So this is plan B, and the outcome is up to you. You tell me how to control Nanika, or you watch me take Killua apart.”

 

2

           

Alluka managed to hang onto Nanika until Illumi’s footfalls on the stairs faded. She could only hope that he was really gone and not cloaking himself, waiting to burst back into the tower and catch them off guard. That, and that she and Nanika would be strong enough to best him before he could do anything terrible to Nanika.

 

 _What are we going to do?_ Alluka wailed into the mind of the wraith-like form floating in front of her. Nanika was a dark ghost with burning blue eyes; a negative image of Alluka, still slightly transparent, although Nanika in her independent form gained solidity by the day. Well, she had, when they had still been training in the privacy of their basement in Lukso Province. What would happen to her now, without Killua’s patient guidance? Would it be better if Nanika withered back to what she had been – tied to Alluka, but harder for Illumi to exploit?

 

But Nanika answered without hesitation, in the speech that had grown more sophisticated by the day once they’d begun separating: _We must keep practicing. We must become stronger than Illumi._

 

Alluka sighed. _But how, with no one to help us?_

 

Nanika came and sat beside her – well, hovered somewhere at floor level – and laid her head on Alluka’s shoulder. _We will help each other._

 

Alluka wanted to cry. Nanika was still so simple in so many ways; she could understand love, but it was the way a dog might understand it: as an absolute, not something that could be twisted and manipulated into a weapon. She held the tears in though, knowing that they would distress Nanika. She reached for Nanika’s hand, threading their fingers together, although the clammy chill of Nanika’s made her shiver.

_Yes, we can help each other get stronger,_ she said, hoping that Nanika hadn’t noticed. _But Illumi is planning some ambush for Gon and Killua. So unless we get strong enough to overpower him before they get here…_ She shook her head. _Nanika, we have no room to practice, no one to spar with. We’ll fight him together if we have to, but we can’t risk it until there isn’t another choice. You know what would happen if he caught you._

 

 _That is why you must use your hatsu on the boy,_ Nanika said

 

Alluka turned to look at her. _The boy? You mean that one with the bird who brings my food?_ Nanika nodded curtly. Alluka had to laugh. _Whenever he comes in here he’s got his ren on full force! How am I meant to get my hatsu around that?_

 

 _Well…he thinks we are pretty._ Nanika paused, playing with Alluka’s fingers, and then she said carefully, _He thinks_ you _are pretty._

 

Alluka frowned. It was still difficult for both of them to refer to themselves or each other as separate beings. But also, what Nanika had said had rankled her. _He thinks I’m a monstrosity,_ she said bitterly. _Thanks to Illumi’s refusal to accept who I am._

 

_He does not think that we – you – are a monstrosity! He is not a mean boy. But he is afraid of us. Illumi has told him to be. So you need to make him unafraid._

 

Alluka shook her head. _I still don’t see the point?_

 

Nanika considered this, rising again, changing her shape to that of a swallowtail butterfly with a bright blue spot on each wing. She swirled around the empty chandelier hanging from the steepled ceiling – almost as far as she could stray from Alluka and maintain her own form. Then she came back to flutter lazily at Alluka’s eye-level. _We will need to warn Killua and Gon before they get here. But we are locked up here._

 

 _You think I can get that boy to go find them and warn them?_ Alluka asked incredulously. _Illumi will never give him the opportunity!_

 

 _No,_ Nanika said. _But I think that you can get him to make his bird do it._

 

 _His_ bird?

_Corvids are intelligent creatures,_ Nanika stated, shifting to the form of the magpie.

 

_Nanika…this is crazy._

 

Nanika sighed, not a sound so much as a cool drift of mist across Alluka’s face. _Perhaps we must be crazy, Alluka, if we are going to save Killua and Gon. And ourselves._

 

Alluka sighed in return. _Great. Any thoughts on where to begin?_

 

3

 

Alluka was ready the next time the boy brought her food. It hadn’t been that difficult to make herself cry. She only had to think of Killua, distraught, panicked, running to the first person he’d ever trusted, to make her eyes well up. She took a deep breath, steadying herself and Nanika within her, as she heard someone opening the locks. With a great effort, she suppressed the ren trying to burst its way out of her, and settled her ten around herself like a shawl, making herself sob audibly – although this was not something she would ever do naturally. Her tears had always been silent. Private. But now she had others to think of.

 

When the door opened, she looked up at the boy through tear-soaked lashes, making her face look as miserable as she could. She felt him pause, saw his bronze-colored ren flicker. She was a little bit surprised that Nanika’s idea had worked so well, but then again, she had always previously met him with ren going strong and stony silence. It made sense that he’d be rattled by her change in demeanor – and she was ready to take advantage of it.

 

“Are…are you all right?” he asked.

 

“What do you think?” she asked, forcing her voice to weak shakiness.

 

The boy set the tray down by the door as he always did, but he didn’t take more than a cautious half step backward. Again, there was a flicker in his ren as he looked at her, and Alluka seized on it, threading her hatsu through the spaces he’d left like a tree in a drought sends its roots toward water. And she found moisture: or, in this case, doubt. Doubt that leaned just a little bit toward sympathy. She seized on it, bent it like a pliable Ash twig, stoking a flameless fire within this boy. She almost felt sorry for him when she saw his eyes widen, but not enough to stop what she was doing.

 

He took a stumbling step forward, not quite voluntarily. The bird on his shoulder uttered a series of soft clicks into his ear, and Alluka wondered if it was trying to warn its master, but he didn’t seem to hear. He approached until he was within a few feet of her, and then asked again, “Are you all right?”

 

“What do you think?” Alluka asked weakly, dropping her head onto her bent arm, all the while sending her hatsu through his weakening defenses like the curling tendrils of a pea plant. Snaring him. She felt it now – what Nanika had spoken of. This boy wasn’t just not mean: he was kind. So what, she wondered, had brought him under Illumi’s spell? There was no needle in his head. Illumi must be manipulating him via something or someone he loved.

 

“Are…have you been…hurt?” he asked tentatively.

 

“What do you think?” she snapped. “My brother kidnapped me and brought me here. My other brother – the one who loves me – probably thinks I’m dead. Illumi hasn’t broken my bones, but yes, he’s hurt me.”

 

She waited, barely breathing, though she tried to muster another sob. Would it work? The boy studied her, his eyes softening, the silence between them loaded with possibility. And then, a voice cut through it – calm, but sharp as a blade. “Joji, what are you doing?”

 

Illumi was standing in the doorway, his eyes fixed on her and the boy – Joji? Joji stood and whirled, snapping the little green shoots Alluka had sent into him in a series of pops that she felt like electric shocks.

 

“I…your sister seemed to be…”

 

“My _sister?”_ Illumi asked with dangerous calm.

 

“I’m sorry…brother…I don’t know…” Joji hung his head.

 

“That,” Illumi said coldly, pointing at Alluka, “is my younger brother, no matter what he may try to make you believe. Do not listen to anything he might tell you, or you will regret it.”

 

Joji nodded once, and then hurried out of the room, while his bird clicked into his ear. Illumi remained until Joji’s footsteps had faded, and then he said to Alluka, “Do not attempt to turn him, little brother. It will go badly for both of you.” Then he spun on his heel and locked the door behind him, leaving Alluka crying in earnest.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wish I could say I thought up the idea of Illumi reading self-help books after his heart-to-heart with Hisoka in the Chairman arc. But I didn't. That gem of a hc belongs to fireolin, and is one more reason why she has my eternal gratitude. If you haven't read her fics, go read them! Now! They're beautiful... And I'm always happy to chat. You can find me on tumblr @glittercracker


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Nothing to say, Gon?” he asked with a tinge of a smirk. “That’s a first!”
> 
> “I…I can’t even think…” Gon stammered.
> 
> “Tell me never to do it again,” Killua said, drawing back a little further, “and I won’t.”
> 
> “Please,” Gon said, his voice shaking, “do it again.”
> 
>  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yep! This, kids, is where we enter 18+ territory. But because there's some pretty important relationship development before things get steamy, I'd hate for those of you who aren't into smut to skip this chapter and end up confused in later chapters because you missed a key conversation. The smut starts just about half way through the chapter, and I've marked the beginning with three stars: *** If you skip everything after that, you'll have the info you need to go on with the story but you won't see anything rated higher than G. Hope that's a solution everyone can live with, since I couldn't really make this an out-take as there's no obvious break.
> 
> Please go look at the beautiful art I got for this chapter! I love it sooo much, and I'm eternally grateful to teethkid for creating it. (There are spoilers in it, kind of, so you might want to read the chapter first.) http://teethkid.tumblr.com

**Whale Island, Friday**

 

1

 

“How long is this going to take?” Killua asked, tugging at his hair as he paced behind the chair where Gon sat at the computer, waiting for the results of his math exam to show up. He’d been sitting there since he came in the door from the village hall where he’d taken the exam, panting from having run all the way.

 

Gon sighed in exasperation. “I don’t _know_ Killua! But it’s not going to go any faster just because you’re pestering me!”

 

“It’s an automated system! The results should show up instantly!”

 

Gon only stared at the screen and shrugged helplessly. “Maybe they have to check to make sure you didn’t cheat.”

 

Killua rolled his eyes, coming to rest at last, leaning against the back of the sofa. “If there had been any way for you to cheat, I’d have helped you do it!”

 

“Killua!” Mito rebuffed gently from the kitchen, where she was making lunch.

 

“Sorry, Mito-san,” Killua said, running a hand over his face. “I wouldn’t have, really. It’s just…” He trailed off, looking out the window, his face more haggard than it had been even on the day he showed up on their doorstep.

 

Gon studied his friend anxiously. Killua was so wound up at this point that he barely made any sense when he spoke. Gon had tried to soothe and reassure him over the last few days, but Killua just wouldn’t settle. Gon couldn’t blame him, but it saddened him and, if he was honest with himself, it hurt him that Killua wouldn’t even let him try. He dodged Gon’s proffered hands, flinching from any accidental physical contact, and after that first night, he had refused to share a bed with him. And so Gon had been forced to watch him toss and turn in his sleep, captive to torturous dreams, longing to lie down beside him and still that thrashing.

 

The “ping” of an incoming email echoed through the silence, and suddenly everyone was crowding in to look at the little computer screen with Gon. Gon tried not to be distracted by the electric hum of Killua’s bare arm against his – they might not have touched since that first morning, but it was noticeably stronger now. Reluctantly he moved his arm to open the email – and before he could even begin to make sense of the words, both Mito and Killua were hugging him and laughing. He knew that it meant he’d passed, that he was free now to leave the island and help Killua find Alluka – but all he could think about was Killua’s arms around him. Warmth surged through him, and though a portion of it was the feeling of his strengthening aura, there was also something more. He shut his eyes and held onto it for as long as it might last.

 

It seemed only moments before everyone was moving again. Killua was talking about getting in touch with Leorio. Mito was fussing about giving them a good meal before they left. Abe was crying and laughing about her great-grandson graduating from high school. Only Gon remained still and silent amidst the commotion, his chin in his hand and his fingers over his mouth, his eyes on the email that he still hadn’t quite taken in. A single thought looped through his mind: _I can’t fail him._

 

2

 

Killua felt himself relax with every mile the shore receded from his view. He was aware, though, that it wasn’t the same for Gon. He had been unusually quiet all afternoon, visibly forcing himself during lunch to stay attentive to the conversation, straining to be cheerful about his aunt’s and great-grandmother’s praise. Mito had brought out the bottle of liquor again, and Gon had drunk two glasses with a determined desperation that had worried Killua. The alcohol hadn’t seemed to relax him at all. But his silent tension as they watched Whale Island disappear into the twilit horizon worried Killua even more.

 

“Gon,” he said at last, turning to him. “What’s going on?”

 

Gon paused, blinked, and then turned serious amber eyes on Killua. “Nerves.”

 

Killua propped his chin on his hands on the ship’s rail. “About facing Illumi?”

 

Gon sighed. “Yes. No. It’s just…Killua…I’m not what I was…” He trailed off, although there was clearly more that he wanted to say. In fact, over the last few days, Killua had become more and more certain that Gon was keeping a significant secret from him.

 

“Of course you’re not,” Killua said when Gon didn’t elaborate. “Neither am I.” Still, Gon said nothing. “So tell me something,” Killua said at last. “What exactly is going on with Kurapika?”

 

“How do you know something’s going on with Kurapika?”

 

“Because you never talk to him. You’ve made all our arrangements through Leorio. Even though they are, as you put it, together. So I’m thinking something happened to him in the Dark Continent.”

 

Gon sighed, looking down into the water, oily dark as the last of the daylight faded. “Something did. Emperor Time.”

 

Killua frowned. “You mean when his eyes turn red?”

 

Gon nodded, his mouth tight, eyes pensive as the first stars tacked the sky. A gibbous moon was rising, painting his bronze skin gold, and Killua had to remind himself not to stare at the stark beauty of Gon’s profile against the silvery waves.

 

“But he put a restriction on it,” Gon said, “to make him stronger. Every second that he used it took an hour off his life. He was chasing eyes…and other things. He…” Gon twitched his shoulders upward in a shrug. “He pushed himself too hard. He almost died.” At last, Gon looked at Killua. His eyes in the moonlight were sad and bled of color.

 

“Leorio saved him?” Killua asked softly, holding Gon’s eyes.

 

“Of course he did! He found a cure…some kind of rice. I don’t know. That’s the story. But Kurapika…” Gon sighed. “He hasn’t ever been the same.”

 

“You’ve seen him?”

 

Gon gave a brief nod. “Leorio brought him to Whale Island twice. I think he hoped it would help.”

 

“It didn’t?”

 

Gon shrugged again. “They were happy when they were with us. Or…as happy as they get, I guess. They still bicker like nothing else.” Killua had to laugh at that, and Gon chuckled too. All too quickly, though, he was serious again.

 

“So how is he different?” Killua asked.

 

“He looks like – like when Aunt Mito has washed a shirt too many times. Faded.”

 

Killua sighed, trying not to think about what this might mean for Alluka. Then he took a deep breath, reached out and laid a hand on Gon’s shoulder. He had been avoiding contact with him since that first night on Whale Island – or, more to the point, the following morning, when he’d wakened tangled with Gon and wished for a moment of mad, crashing desire that they could stay like that forever. Since that moment, he’d been too afraid to touch Gon, terrified of waking those feelings again. But he knew that his avoidance had hurt Gon, and if he was honest with himself, it had hurt him, too.

 

Gon turned to him, his eyes wide with surprise. “Thank you for coming with me,” Killua said softly.

 

“Killua,” Gon said, equally gently. “Did you ever think I wouldn’t?”

 

“Yes,” Killua said without hesitation. “About a thousand times on the way to Whale Island. I almost turned back as many.”

 

“But you didn’t,” Gon said with a small smile.

 

“I didn’t.” Killua drew a deep breath, sighed it out. “It was time. Long past time.”

 

Gon studied Killua for a moment, and then looked back out over the water, his islander’s eyes fixed on some horizon Killua knew that he would never be able to see. “There’s something I need to tell you,” Gon said at last.

 

 _Am I ready to hear it?_ Killua wondered, beginning to blush. “Is there?”

 

“Yes,” Gon said. “But…maybe we could get a drink first?”

 

3

 

One drink turned into two – some kind of clear, potent liquor from Killua’s country, which he chose and paid for – but Gon still couldn’t bring himself to tell Killua about his nen. He almost wished Killua would pester him about what he’d wanted to discuss, but Killua hadn’t said a word about it since they reached the ship’s bar.

 

They walked to their cabin in ruminative silence. A single was all they’d been able to secure on such short notice. They’d already agreed to switch off between the bed and the floor, but when Gon unlocked the door it was clear that that plan wasn’t going to work. There was barely enough floor space for them to set down their rucksacks. A tiny sink, a decent-sized bunk with a bedside table built into the wall, and a small, round chair took up the rest of the area.

 

Killua said, “I’ll take the chair tonight.”

 

Gon rolled his eyes, then picked Killua up, tossed him on the bed and flopped down beside him. “You will _not_ take the chair, and neither will I. Killua.” He grabbed Killua’s hand as he tried to twist away. “ _Killua._ What are you afraid of?”

 

Killua stilled, then sighed, shutting his eyes. “I don’t know.”

 

Gon turned on his side and studied him in the dim light of the bedside lamp. Killua’s silvery lashes meshed like frost ferns on winter glass. He had one arm thrown over his forehead, its muscles twining long and lean and so unlike Gon’s own. Gon reached out a finger and ran it along a ridge of muscle on Killua’s forearm. He expected him to pull away, but instead Killua opened his eyes and turned toward Gon.

 

“You said you had something to tell me.”

           

Gon let his hand rest on Killua’s arm, feeling the warm, sweet pull of nen, and that other something that was behind it. Because Killua still didn’t pull away, he let himself do what he hadn’t dared to over the last few days: he spread Killua’s hand wide on the bedspread, palm up, and twined their fingers together. Killua flushed, but he watched Gon intently as he curled his fingers shut, locking their hands together. After a moment, Killua’s own fingers closed, and Gon let out a breath he hadn’t known that he’d been holding. Now, he could only hope that telling Killua his secret wouldn’t sever this fragile connection.

 

“It’s a big something, Killua,” he said tentatively.

 

“I figured it was,” Killua answered. “Tell me.”

 

Gon drew a breath. Neither of them blinked. “My nen…I think it’s coming back.”

 

A beat of silence, and then Killua sat up abruptly. “ _What?_ You didn’t tell me this until _now?”_

Gon sat up with him, tightening his hand around Killua’s in a panic that he would run – but Killua left his hand in Gon’s, limp, probably forgotten as he stared at him in shock. “I – I didn’t know how to tell you. It only happened when I saw you.”

 

Killua shook his head, his eyes narrowing, confused. “When you saw me?”

 

“No – yes – well, when I touched you. I mean, I’ve been trying.” Gon let out a long sigh, rubbed his eyes with his free hand. “Ever since Nanika healed me, and I talked to Ging…” He stopped, not knowing how to continue past that.

 

“Go on,” Killua said, his tone unreadable.

 

 _Yes,_ Gon thought. _Just tell him. You_ have _to tell him!_ “Killua…Ging told me to go back to the beginning. To meditate. He said that way, someday, I might get it back. But I’ve been doing that for almost five years and…well…nothing’s happened. Nothing until the first time I touched you again.” He raised his eyes, tentatively, to Killua’s. “Then, I felt it. That feeling…you know it.” He shook his head, wishing he could put it into words properly. “Like when we first learned how to use it, with Wing and Zushi. Except it’s coming back faster. Every time I touch you – ”

 

Killua’s eyes were suddenly stony. “So _that’s_ why you’ve been trying to get your hands on me this whole week!” He pulled his hand free of Gon’s and got up off the bed.

 

“No!” Gon cried, anguish running through him in cold waves. “No, _no!_ Please, Killua, you have to understand! I don’t care about it – the nen! I mean, I was willing to try, but I didn’t really care whether it came back or not! I didn’t even think I deserved it. I still don’t.” Killua stood watching him, unblinking, clearly poised to walk out. “Please, _please,_ Killua!” Gon realized that there were tears running down his cheeks. “Don’t leave again. Please, don’t leave again…”

 

“Why shouldn’t I?” Killua asked, but there was no cruelty in his tone. It was an honest question, Gon could sense that. It was something that he needed to know for certain before – what?

 

“Because,” Gon said, forcing his voice to sound between sobs, “if you leave me one more time, I don’t think I can stand it. And – ”

 

“Gon,” Killua said, his voice softening. He came back to the bed and sat down beside him.

 

“N-no. Wait. I need to tell you.”

 

Killua sighed. “There’s more?”

 

“Yes! I have to tell you I’m sorry. I’m _so_ sorry for what I did, with Kite and Pitou and all of it!”

 

“We went through this when it happened, and I told you I didn’t blame you.”

 

“I know,” Gon said miserably. “But then you stopped writing to me, and I thought it must be because you realized you _were_ mad at me. And I can’t stand it if you’re mad at me. If I could just be with you, like we used to be, then I’d give up my nen a hundred times…I’d give up anything…” Gon couldn’t force any more words out; he dissolved into tears.

 

There was a long silence, broken only by Gon’s quiet sobs. Then Killua said, “Look at me, Gon.”

 

Gon looked up. Killua’s eyes were dark in the thick shadows, the silvery tips of his hair standing out against the backlight like a jagged halo. But his voice was low and velvety when he leaned forward, took Gon’s chin in his hands, tipped it up so that their eyes met and said, “That isn’t why I stopped writing. I’m not mad at you.”

 

Gon’s breath hitched as hope surged in him. “You’re not?”

 

“No, I’m not. But we can never be like we were.”

 

Fresh tears sprang to Gon’s eyes, and he wanted to turn away, but Killua wouldn’t let him, keeping firm hold of his chin. “Why not?” he asked wretchedly.

 

He expected a sharp answer, a cruel end to the long dream he’d held onto through so many lonely years that someday, he and Killua could be together again. Instead, he felt Killua’s other hand come up, gently brush the tears from his cheeks. And then Killua’s lips were on his, warm and soft and perfect, filling an emptiness he hadn’t known he had inside him.

 

“That’s why,” Killua answered after a moment.

 

Gon could only stare at him, stunned.

 

“Nothing to say, Gon?” he asked with a tinge of a smirk. “That’s a first!”

 

“I…I can’t even think…” Gon stammered.

 

“Tell me never to do it again,” Killua said, drawing back a little further, “and I won’t.”

 

“Please,” Gon said, his voice shaking, “do it again.”

 

***

 

“Those are the magic words,” Killua smiled, but there was nothing gentle in it. It wasn’t far off the smile Killua wore when he was about to dive into a fight he’d been itching for, but the zinging heat it sent racing through Gon was nothing like bloodlust. Killua pushed him back onto the thin mattress, locked his knees on either side of Gon’s hips, and began to kiss him in earnest.

 

It was like a stream in a springtime storm, Gon thought – at first there was only the hint of desire, like a trickle of water over stones, and then, without warning, it was crashing over him, bursting its banks, erasing everything that came into its path. He kissed Killua with wild abandon, reaching up to press himself closer to him, because it felt like they could never be close enough.

 

He felt Killua’s hardness against him, and realized how hard he was himself. He gasped as they ground together, dizzy, his vision spangled with brightness. He had never felt longing like this, as sharp as it was sweet, and he desperately wanted to chase it; but at the same time, he was afraid. He had never touched another man, and this wasn’t just any man: it was Killua, his best friend, whom he’d loved for so long. Killua, who was beautiful as moonlight on snow and who _had_ been touched by other men.

 

“Gon,” Killua panted, drawing back, “what’s wrong?”

 

“I…I’m scared.”

 

Killua stilled. “We don’t have to do anything more than this. We don’t even have to do _this_ , if you don’t want to.”

 

“But I do want to! I _really_ want to! I just don’t know how.”

 

“Well then,” Killua said with a laugh that bordered on predatory, “let me show you.”

 

Gon nodded, and Killua pulled his hips hard against his own, sending another blinding flash of pleasure through him as their cocks ground together. Killua moved slowly, dragging against Gon until Gon heard himself whimpering. Killua began to rock against him in a slow, maddening rhythm, and Gon pressed his face into Killua’s neck, his own body moving with an instinct he hadn’t known he possessed.

 

“Ready to try this without clothes?” Killua asked when Gon’s breath began to stutter. “Because it’s going to get very messy if we keep them on.”

 

He could only nod again, and then Killua was turning him over, pulling off his shirt, taking a moment to trace down the dip between the muscles of his chest and stomach before he worked his shorts loose. Gon felt his cock spring free and he shuddered, closing his eyes and trying to breathe as Killua wriggled beside him, shedding his own clothes. When he felt smooth, bare skin against his, he turned to look at Killua.

 

His body was just as beautiful as Gon had imagined, like carved marble in the golden light. But he had never imagined what Killua’s cock might look like, and now he couldn’t stop staring at it, rising from a swirl of silver hair, hard and pink and leaking a little, longer and thinner than his own and utterly mesmerizing.

 

“Something wrong with it, Gon?” Killua asked, turning toward him, his head rested on one outstretched arm.

 

“No…of course not…it’s…I mean, I’ve just never seen one, except my own. Can I…?”

 

Killua smiled. “Yes, you can touch it. In fact, I might have to kick your ass if you don’t.”

 

Gon reached out with hesitant fingers, touched the tip of it, and then pulled back when it bobbed in response.

 

“Gon. It won’t bite.”

 

Gon reached out again, ran a thumb over the head, and then, when Killua let out a small moan, he grasped the shaft, stroked upward. Killua hissed in a breath, and then he caught Gon by the hair, started to kiss him again. Gon’s timidity evaporated. He pushed himself at Killua, who reached down for his own cock and began stroking him hard. And then Killua was on top of him, beautiful and ruthless and unrestrained, all teeth and claws and hot tongue, like a jungle cat, and Gon could only wonder how he’d lived so long without him. He wanted to devour him, to fill the hunger of those missing years. He grabbed Killua and flipped him onto his back, laughing at the sudden wideness of Killua’s eyes.

 

When his laughter died down, Killua quirked an eyebrow at him. “Well, you seem to have the upper hand…for the moment. What are you planning to do with it?”

 

Gon ran rough fingers through Killua’s silky hair. “I want you to feel good.”

 

Killua’s eyes glittered. “I’m not exactly hating this, if you haven’t noticed,” he said, thrusting his hips up so that their cocks slid together, making both of them cry out.

 

Then Gon pushed him back down. “But I want to do something just for you. I know how hard everything has been for you the last few weeks, and I want to make you feel better. It…well…I mean, it feels good when someone sucks on your dick – ”

 

“Gon,” Killua said, flushing.

 

“Only, I’ve never done it,” Gon plunged on. “So, I want you to tell me how.”

 

Killua looked at him for a wide-eyed moment, and then he groaned. “Are you actually asking me to tell you how to give me a blow job?”

 

Gon pushed back. “Well if you don’t _want_ one – ” he huffed.

 

“No!” Killua cried, clutching his shoulders. “I mean yes! Yes, I do want one! I just…oh, shit, Gon? Are we really here? Is this really happening?”

 

“We’re really here,” Gon laughed, and then paused, processing the words. “Does that mean you thought about it before? Doing this, with me?”

 

Killua narrowed his eyes. “What kind of question is that?” he asked.

 

“An honest question. Because _I_ thought about it.”

 

Killua spluttered. “Please don’t tell me that you thought about me when you were getting yourself off!”

 

“Why? Did you? And I asked first.”

 

Killua let out a long sigh. “Oh, what the hell. Okay, yes, I thought about it. Not all the time or anything, but I mean…” he shrugged helplessly. “Yeah. I did.”

 

Gon kissed him, and then he said, “Me too. Sometimes when I was – ”

 

“You can stop right there.”

 

“Jerking off,” Gon persisted. “But mostly it was with those girls.”

 

“ _What?”_

“I…I wished they were you.”

 

“Holy shit, Gon. How can you _say_ things like that?” He shook his head, but then he smiled, ran a finger along Gon’s lips. “Although I guess, all things considered, I should be flattered?” Gon smiled back, then took one of Killua’s fingers into his mouth and sucked it, making him moan softly. “Wait,” he said, his voice shaky, “before this goes any further…did you happen to bring any of that motherlode of condoms your aunt gave you?”

 

Gon shook his head. “But I don’t have any diseases, Killua. I got tested.”

 

“You did?”

 

“Aunt Mito made me, after she found out that I had sex. And you don’t have any diseases either.”

 

Killua raised his eyebrows. “How can you possibly know that?”

 

Gon shrugged. “I can smell if someone’s healthy.”

 

“Interesting as that fact is, I’m not sure you should rely on your sense of smell for something as important as this. But – ” he added, as Gon began to protest “ – you don’t have to. I got tested too, once we settled down in Lukso. I mean, I was always careful, but I wanted to make sure.”

 

“So _now_ will you tell me how?”

 

Killua let out a soft laugh, and a sigh, and then he pulled Gon off of him. “If you mean it…”

 

“I mean it!”

 

Killua smiled. “Your enthusiasm is touching! Okay, look, you must know the basic concept. So…let’s just try it and see where we get.”

 

Gon scooted down the bed and tentatively took Killua’s length into his mouth. One girl had done this for him, and he remembered the sliding heat of her lips and tongue, which had been nice, and the scrape of teeth, which hadn’t. So he tried to keep his teeth out of the picture. Hearing Killua let out a soft moan after a few glides of his tongue, he tried to take him deeper. This, he was fairly sure, was what was meant to happen. But then he couldn’t breathe and quickly pulled back, coughing.

 

He was mortified, his eyes already stinging, when he felt a soft hand in his hair. “Gon…Gon. Don’t do that. _No one_ does that…well, not the first time, as far as I know. Only in porn films and fanfictions.”

 

Gon, still cringing, said, “So what do I do, then?”

 

“Put your hand here,” Killua said, taking Gon’s hand and placing it at the bottom of his shaft. “Put your mouth on the rest. Do what you want with that…but just so you know, a tongue feels _really_ good on the head and the slit, and just behind that, on the baaaa – ”

 

Gon smiled inwardly as he ran his tongue up from his clasped hand to the tip of Killua’s cock, along the ridge on the back side, and then swirled it around the tip. He lifted his mouth for a moment to ask, “Is that good?”

 

“That’s…really…” And then Killua was moaning again, more loudly this time, and moving his hips as Gon sucked and licked at him. After a few moments Killua closed his hand around Gon’s and showed him how to work the base of his shaft as he sucked the top. It wasn’t long before Killua was arching his back, clearly trying hard not to thrust into Gon’s mouth.

 

“Gon…” he gasped. “I’m going to…if you don’t want to…”

 

But Gon only sucked harder, moved his hand in a faster rhythm, and then hot saltiness was shooting into his mouth. For moment he froze, not knowing what to do; and then he did know what to do. He swallowed it, working Killua through the spasms until he was finished and beginning to soften. Then, with a final lick, he let go of his cock, and moved up his stomach with wide, wet kisses. When he reached Killua’s jaw he paused, thinking that Killua wouldn’t want to kiss him.

 

But Killua tangled his hands in Gon’s hair, pulling him into a deep kiss, licking him and murmuring praise in turn, until he stopped to say, “Your turn.”

 

“Oh, no!” Gon protested. “I don’t need to – ”

 

“I think you do, actually,” Killua said, kissing his way down Gon’s collarbone to his chest, where he teased Gon’s nipples with a hot tongue. “I think maybe we’ve both needed this for a very long time.” And as Killua worked his way down Gon’s body with his mouth, Gon had to agree.        

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Gon gets his groove back, but it isn't quite what he expected. Plus morning-after introspection. And fluff. And a fight. And more fluff. Mildly nsfw but nothing explicit.

 

**Aboard the Maru**

1

Killua woke to a funnel of light through the salt-crusted porthole. He opened his eyes to it, and then shut them again, turning in Gon’s arms to press his face into the warm skin of his neck, drifting on a current of serenity that was entirely new to him. He couldn’t remember a time in his life when he’d felt so perfectly relaxed, so purely content to be in the moment he was currently living, to simply breathe in and out.

 

A part of him felt guilt at this, given Alluka’s situation. But at the same time, morning had brought with it a kind of clarity that was also brand-new to Killua: an ability to accept the present that stilled the turbulent water that always swirled within him. He had faced his demons and accepted that there was nothing that he could do for Alluka here or now, and so he could let himself accept the gift that Gon had given him in the meantime.

 

And it was a tremendous gift, he knew that; not just the searing pleasure of Gon’s warm hands and mouth on him, but what Gon had allowed him to give in return. That had been far more powerful in its way – holding on to his first and best friend as he shook him to pieces, and then gathering those pieces in again, re-forming them into something far more precious and beautiful than he could ever have imagined. And damn, was Gon beautiful. He tilted his head to look at him. His burnished face was relaxed in the early morning light, his lashes oil-black brush strokes on his freckled cheeks. Killua couldn’t resist brushing a fingertip along one high cheekbone, then pressing a kiss into his throat.  

 

Clearly still more asleep than awake, Gon pulled him closer, kissing him clumsily on the crown of his head and running the fingers of one hand up and down Killua’s spine until it arched with pleasure. “Damn it, Gon – I’m barely awake,” he muttered into his neck, but he nipped playfully at it all the same.

 

Gon chuckled, his other hand running down the cleft between Killua’s abs until he found his cock, already hard. It was normal for him to be hard in the morning, but this was something different. When Gon touched him there, Killua shuddered with a feeling not unlike unleashing a powerful lightning bolt.

 

“You seem pretty awake to me,” Gon murmured, kissing his rumpled hair again and tightening his hand, beginning to stroke.

 

“Gon, maybe we shouldn’t – ”

 

“Why not?” Gon asked, his eyes suddenly wide open. “Did I do something wrong last night?”

 

Killua had to laugh; but still, he took Gon’s hand off of his cock and threaded his fingers through Gon’s, kissed them. “No,” Killua answered. “You were perfect,” he said, trying and failing to keep the quiver out of his voice. “But before this goes any further, we need to talk about it.”

 

“Talk about what?” Gon asked, his brow furrowing in a way that made Killua want to forget everything that ought to be said, and just kiss him. But he couldn’t do that. Not with all that lay ahead of them. He felt the easy calm draining out of him by the moment, and he wanted to chase it, to clutch it, but he didn’t know how.

 

“This,” Killua said, gesturing between them. “It happened a lot faster than I thought it would.”

 

“So you thought it would?” Gon asked, his eyes dancing and his lips tilting upward.

 

Killua felt the blood rushing to his cheeks. “Fuck, Gon, do you ever let up?”

 

“I’m sorry,” Gon said, actually looking semi-contrite. “Say what you want to say. Wait – unless – do you wish we hadn’t – ”

 

“No! Gon, no. I have no regrets.” Killua kissed him deeply. When he pulled back, he said, “It’s just that there’s so much we haven’t talked about.”

 

“Like what?” Gon said, his eyes on the ceiling, dancing with the reflection of the water.

 

“I meant what I said last night. We can never be what we used to be.”

 

“I…don’t understand?”

 

“We aren’t little kids anymore, for one thing.”

 

Gon laughed. “Of course we’re not! I mean after we – ”

 

“Okay, yeah, I got it! Rhetorical statement, not even a question, no need to elaborate!” Killua ran a hand over his crimson face. “What I mean is, if we’re going to do this – ”

 

“Have sex?” Gon interrupted.

 

“Yes, Gon,” Killua sighed, “and everything else that goes with it, when you aren’t just in it for a night of fun.”

 

“I’m not.”

 

“Good to know. Neither am I. The point is, you said you’re getting your nen back, and touching me is making it happen. I kind of think we’re going to be doing a lot of touching in the near future. But we’re also walking into battle with my brother. You need to know that I _will_ die for Alluka if I have to – not just because I love her, but because if Illumi brainwashes her, we can all pretty much kiss this world good-bye. And _I_ need to know that if something _does_ happen to me, and you’re back at full strength, you aren’t going to implode again.”

 

Gon shuddered. “I…am not going to do what I did before. Ever again.”

 

Killua let out a breath he’d been holding for too long. “I also need to know that if something happens to me, you’ll take my place. You’ll try to keep Alluka safe.”

 

“Killua,” Gon said, turning over to face him. “I would do anything for you. I already said that. And that means I’d also do anything for anyone you love. Pinky swear?”

 

“Are you kidding me?” Gon didn’t drop his hand, only raised an eyebrow at Killua. “Oh, fine!” Killua linked his pinky finger with Gon’s, and they recited together:

 

“Pinky swear made, whoever breaks their promise has to swallow – ”

 

“Ahh, could we leave out the part with the needles?” Killua interrupted.

 

“Slugs?” Gon suggested.

 

Killua rolled his eyes. “Okay. Has to swallow a thousand slugs.” They both repeated it, and then continued, “Sealed with a kiss!” Gon pressed his thumb to Killua’s, and then he grabbed his hand and pulled Killua on top of him. “Now give me a real one,” he laughed.

 

“Gon,” Killua protested, “I’m starving!”

 

“Good thing I ordered room service then, isn’t it?”

 

Killua stared at him. “You what? When?”

 

Gon just laughed again. “We have about half an hour before the food comes. How do you want to kill it?” Before Killua could answer, he pulled him into a kiss.

 

2

 

Both of them were a mess by the time breakfast arrived: Killua had to clean Gon up and hand him the least destroyed of their scattered clothing and kick the rest under the chair before he would let him open the door. Killua simply hid under the covers until the transaction was finished – but by the time the door closed on the cabin, the smell of food was irresistible. Killua peeked out from under the covers to find Gon smiling at him, eyes crinkled at the corners.

 

“Better get up, Killua, or I’ll eat everything! Sex makes me hungry…” he added, surveying the laden tray he’d set on top of the sink.

 

“Gon,” Killua croaked. “Do you have to say it like that?”

 

Gon looked over at Killua again. He was no more than a tuft of white hair and two wide, blue eyes meeting Gon’s from beneath the bedclothes. Gon poured a cup of coffee and took a sip. “Do you want me to call it something else? I mean it’s true, neither of us actually put our penises in – ”

 

“GON!” Killua cried.

 

“Well, I mean, we didn’t.”

 

“Gon. Just. Stop.”

 

“But is it still sex when you don’t put your – ”

 

“ _Gon,”_ Killua nearly wept, the bit of his face that Gon could see flushed crimson, and Gon stopped speaking. He would never understand why it rattled Killua so much to talk about simple facts. However, he also didn’t want to make Killua unhappy, especially when the strained, tortured look of the past week had finally left him. And so he put down his coffee and poured a cup of hot chocolate. Then he loaded a plate with chocolate croissants, and brought them to the bed.

 

“Here,” he said, sitting down beside him. “Eat something. I promise not to say anything embarrassing.”

 

Killua stacked two pillows and then shimmied up the bed until he was sitting. He took the cup and plate from Gon, still blushing. “I’m not sure I believe you can stop yourself.”

“I’ll try?” Gon shrugged. “But…am I allowed to tell you how pretty you look right now?”

 

Killua choked on a sip of hot chocolate, flushing all over again. “There is no way that I look like anything but a fucking disaster.”

 

Gon’s eyes traveled from Killua’s tangled silver hair to the bites and bruises on his neck and chest. He considered the ridged plain of Killua’s stomach – also not entirely without evidence of what they’d been doing – until it disappeared under the sheets.

 

“I wouldn’t say a disaster,” Gon said at last. “But you do look fucked.”

 

For several long moments Killua stared at Gon, unblinking. Gon bit his lip, waiting for Killua to start yelling at him. Instead, Killua began to laugh. He shoved his cup at Gon, who put it on the table beside the bed, along with the precariously tipping plate of pastries. Then he toppled into Gon’s lap, laughing helplessly. Gon laughed with him, bemused, until Killua finally regained enough control over himself to roll over and look up at Gon with teary eyes. Gon raised his eyebrows, questioning.

 

“I’m sorry,” Killua gasped, “but I didn’t think I’d ever, _ever_ hear that word come out of your mouth!”

           

Gon shrugged. “You also probably never thought I’d have your dick _in_ my mouth but – ah! Sorry, Killua. I know I said I’d try not to talk about it.”

 

Killua waved a hand as laughter threatened to overtake him again. “I give up! Hearing you say the word ‘fuck’ is worth just about anything else your unflitered brain might come up with. Not – ” he said quickly, pushing himself up so that he could look Gon in the eye, “ – that that’s a challenge.”

 

Gon only laughed, and kissed him, licking the sweetness of the hot chocolate from his lips and tracing his fingers down a pale, exposed hip. For a moment Killua let him, but when he tried to move his hand downward, Killua slapped it away and pulled back. “Nope. Not again.”

 

“Not again _ever?”_ Gon whined.

 

Killua rolled his eyes. “Not again right now. First of all, I’m starving,” he said, reaching across Gon for one of the croissants and biting into it, adding a scatter of flaky crumbs to their ruined bed.

 

“Second of all?” Gon asked, munching on one of his own.

 

“Second of all, we have work to do.”

 

“Work?” Gon asked.

 

“You said your nen is coming back, and that touching me is what’s doing it?” Gon nodded. “Well, in the past twelve hours you’ve touched me in about as many ways as is humanly possible. So I think it’s time to see what you can do.”

 

Gon’s stomach twisted in apprehension; he could barely make himself swallow the food in his mouth. But he knew that Killua was right. He had to know what he was capable of. So he swallowed, drew a deep breath, and said, “Okay.”

 

3

 

An hour later they were both clean and dressed and, after an attempt at making it a bit less obvious what had been going on in their cabin, they’d left it for a sunny patch of the ship’s deck far away from other passengers. Now they were seated across from each other, at Killua’s insistence, meditating. Almost immediately after entering the meditative state, Gon could sense that all of his micropyles were open. This hadn’t happened in so long it was almost overwhelming, the aura flowing out of him in uncontrolled waves not unlike the longing he’d felt when Killua first kissed him.

 

“You aren’t focusing,” Killua interrupted his reverie. “Your aura is all over the place. Not to mention that I didn’t actually ask you to let it out, yet.” Killua opened his eyes, meeting Gon’s, which were already open. “Unless you can’t control it?”

 

“I was distracted,” Gon said. “I haven’t felt it in so long.”

 

Gon was fairly certain that Killua saw through the half-truth, but he ignored it, his face stern and not unlike those of the instructors they’d had when they were first training so long ago. “Fine. But try to turn it into ten.”

 

Gon concentrated, thinking of the words Wing had used on their first, aborted lesson. _Focus your soul._ He tried to bring his wildly spinning mind to heel, and gradually, looking at the grain in the worn wood of the deck between his knees, he was able to. When he felt the warm slip of his aura settling around him, he thought of the first words he’d used to describe it. Warm mucus. Killua was right: his brain was unfiltered. Still, though, remembering that feeling, back in that homely room where he’d first sensed it, brought the focus clearer, so that he jumped when Killua spoke again.

 

“Okay, I’m going to throw something at you. Nothing too hard in case you can’t block it.”

 

Gon thought that he could probably block a lot right now, but he also knew that Killua wasn’t entirely comfortable with this exercise, despite having suggested it. He gave a nod, and a moment later, he felt the zing of a small lightning bolt rushing at him. He braced for it to puncture his defensive aura, to knock him flat on the weatherworn deck, but it only rocked him slightly as his ten deflected it. He could see that Killua was as surprised as he was when he met his eye, still upright.

 

“Okay,” Killua said carefully. “So you really have got something back. But that was pretty basic.”

 

“Hit me harder,” Gon said without pause.

 

“Gon. Do you really think you should – ”

 

“Yes! If we’re going to face Illumi and who knows which of his asshole friends, we need to know what I’m capable of.”

 

Killua grinned. “Okay, who taught you to swear?”

 

“Advanced math.”

 

Killua laughed out loud at that. “Fair enough! Well then, when you’re ready…?”

 

“I’m ready.”

 

Killua drew in a far larger electrical bolt, and then flung it at Gon. This time he rocked in place, but still he remained upright. Killua narrowed his eyes. “There’s no way that I’m going to challenge you to a fight here…but you’ve got a pretty impressive defense going. We’re going to have to test this. For the moment, though, let’s see where your zetsu is at.”

 

“You mean just…try it?”

 

“For starters.”

 

“Umm, okay. But be careful. If you destroy me while I’m hidden, I won’t be able to suck your – ”

 

“Gon.”

 

“Ahh…okay.” Gon shut his eyes again and concentrated, attempting to mask the aura he’d barely got under control. It was difficult. He was sweating by the time Killua spoke again.

 

“That’s good. You’re pretty well hidden. But let’s test it for real.”

 

“How?” Gon asked.

 

“Hide and seek,” Killua said, quirking a smile. “I won’t use zetsu – you need practice finding auras if you’re really getting all of this back. But you use yours. Go anywhere on the ship. I’ll try to find you. Oh, and I’ll wear these.” Killua brought a pair of sunglasses out of his shorts pocket.

 

“How are sunglasses going to help?”

 

Killua turned them around. The lenses were taped: he wouldn’t be able to see through them. He would have to move around the ship by sense of aura alone.

 

Gon felt himself brighten at the prospect of a game. “How many rounds?”

 

“As many as it takes until I can’t find you.”

 

“Is there a prize?”

 

Killua shook his head and sighed. “Isn’t getting your nen back prize enough?”

 

“Not really,” Gon said. “I mean, given what else is on offer.” He grinned at Killua, who rolled his eyes.

 

“Okay. If you actually do it well enough that I can’t find you, then you get to ask me for something.”

 

“And you have to do it?”

 

“I have to do it.”

 

Gon laughed out loud, throwing his head back to face the sun. They might be walking into an ugly fight, but he didn’t think he’d ever been so happy in his entire life. Maybe he never would be again, after this sea voyage was over. So he was determined to win. “Put on your glasses, Killua, and count to ten.”

 

*

 

Gon was annoyed – he was trying his hardest and he could feel the aura burrowing back inside of him, but apparently he’d missed enough that Killua had no trouble finding him the first few rounds. But as the day wore on, he got better at evading Killua, until finally, sometime in the early evening, Gon heard him yell, “I give up!” from his perch on the bowsprit of the boat.

 

Most other passengers had gone to dinner by then, and so Gon traversed an empty deck to reach Killua at the stern of the ship, where he’d taken off his glasses to watch the churning wake of the boat’s engines disappearing into the twilight. Gon sneaked up on him, and he was secretly delighted that Killua didn’t seem to notice until Gon laid two hands on his shoulders. He was even more delighted (although he hadn’t braced and so he fell awkwardly) when Killua whirled on him and threw him to the deck, straddling him and pinning his arms.

 

“Gon,” Killua said, “don’t _do_ that! I could have hurt you!”

 

“I don’t think so,” Gon said, and Killua felt the push of ren coming from Gon.

 

“You’ve got that back, too?” he asked incredulously. “In just one day?”

 

“Killua,” Gon said, dropping the ren and pulling Killua close to him, “we learned nen in a couple of hours the first time, well enough to fend off Hisoka. It isn’t that weird that I’m getting it back fast – is it?”

 

They looked at each other for a long moment in the fading, grey-violet light. Killua’s eyes swarmed with the dark colors of the twilight sea around them. “I guess it’s not,” he said at last. “But do you remember how to control it?”

 

Gon sighed. “I remember. But I haven’t really tried it yet. I mean, I haven’t tried my old hatsu…”

 

Killua was silent for a moment, then he said, “It’s late. We’ve been working hard. Let’s get dinner, and deal with that tomorrow?”

 

Gon nodded. But Killua was still in his arms, and he couldn’t resist leaning forward and kissing him. It wasn’t a deep kiss, and it wasn’t meant to lead to more. It was an acknowledgment of what had passed that day, and its significance. And Killua kissed him back, sweetly, resolutely.

 

After a few minutes, though, he pulled back. “Dinner, Gon. Then you get your request.” He smiled a wicked smile, pulled Gon to his feet, and dragged him in the direction of the dining room.

 

4

 

Killua knew that the days on the ferry were precious; a tiny stolen window before what could only be a punishing and indefinite near future. He’d told Gon everything he could about Alluka’s new abilities, and how concerned he was that they could as easily prove a liability in dealing with Illumi as an asset. Gon had sympathized, but told him what he already knew: there was nothing they could presently do about it. After that, Killua kept the anxiety confined, giving as much of himself as he could to Gon both in his training and the times that followed, when they were alone together.

 

And those times were a revelation, in more ways than one. Gon wasn’t at all the kind of lover that Killua would have expected. Although he didn’t tell Gon this, he had imagined them together ever since he’d lost his virginity. He’d imagined it more times than he was comfortable confronting, even now. Since he’d always been somewhat at the mercy of Gon’s headlong rush through life and all its experiences, and he hadn’t expected sex with him to be any different. It was a surprise, then, to find that Gon was careful with him. That he would restrain what was no doubt a lust as headstrong as the rest of his personality to make sure that Killua was happy.

 

And Killua was more than happy. He was awed by the powerful feelings Gon had awakened in him. He had always loved him; he knew that now as surely as he’d ever known anything. But the tenderness with which Gon’s wide, callused hands would stroke him, the warmth in his eyes when he smiled down at him, the way that he asked permission, asked Killua what he wanted – none of those things fit with his previous experience. Nor were they what he would have expected of a man whose own experience consisted of a few flings with girls he didn’t know.

 

In the space of two days, Gon had made him long for things that Killua hadn’t known he wanted. Now that he had them, though, he was terrified of losing them. Terrified of losing Gon, again. Because he was hopelessly in love with him, and just as Gon had been his first and best friend, he doubted that there was anyone else in the world he could ever fall in love with.

 

Killua sighed, and looked over at Gon’s sleeping face. Gon being Gon, he gave himself entirely to sex, and though he had admirable stamina, he always wore himself out first, leaving Killua awake and oddly bereft, even with their limbs still twined together. He watched the flicker of Gon’s eyelids as he dreamed and the ship rocked on the stormy sea that had cut that day’s practice short.

 

He wondered if Gon was as worried in his dreams as Killua now knew that he was when awake. Although Gon’s ten and ren and zetsu were returning almost alarmingly quickly, his hatsu wasn’t. Given that the storm had driven everybody else indoors, after a couple hours practicing the nen abilities they’d worked on the previous day, Gon had suggested trying out his hatsu. But Killua’s deflection of the first, simple punch he’d thrown had been enough to send Gon skidding across the rain-slick deck on his back, his knuckles already bruising. After that, Killua had toned down his offense, but even with the most basic ten, he was able to make Gon stumble.

 

Gon had sunk to his knees on the ship’s heaving deck, rain running off of him and not quite hiding the tears in his eyes. “It’s okay, Gon,” Killua had said, sitting down beside him and gathering him into his arms. “It hasn’t even been two days. You can’t expect it all to come back at once.”

 

“But Killua, it _has_ come back,” Gon said, his voice hitching. “I can feel it there, the aura ready to do what I tell it to do…but then it just _won’t.”_

 

Killua had sighed, kissed Gon’s wet head. “Maybe it’s changed,” he said, after they’d sat like that for some moments.

 

“Changed?” Gon had asked, looking across at him.

 

Killua had shrugged. “I mean, your nen was wiped out, and you’re basically starting from scratch. Maybe you aren’t an enhancer anymore. Maybe you’re something else.”

 

Gon had brightened at that thought, and dragged Killua to the bar to get a glass of water to test himself on. But he hadn’t been able to change the water at all, and that had left him even more discouraged. So Killua had told him to let it lie for a while, and because he had known that Gon wouldn’t do that without distraction, he’d bought them two pints of beer and an extravagant lunch, and then taken him to bed.

 

Killua had worked hard to make sure that Gon’s anxieties didn’t unravel him, and Gon had fallen asleep mostly happy. Now, though? Killua sighed, turning to wrap him in his arms, as close as he could get, hot and sticky though they both still were. _If this is how you get it, Gon, then take it,_ he thought. _Take it all._

 

5

 

Gon awakened to light through the porthole: the sun was shining, though the sea was still rough. Killua was behind him, holding him tightly, breathing in tandem with him. For a time Gon just lay there, not letting himself think about anything but the sweetness of their joint breath. But he couldn’t quite push away the memory of his utter failure to break through even Killua’s weakest ten, and with that thought, sleep fled.

 

He turned in Killua’s arms and nudged his nose with his own. Killua groaned and burrowed further under the covers. “Killua, wake up!” Gon said.

 

“Nope,” Killua muttered, snuggling into Gon’s chest.

 

“Kiiiilluaaa!” Gon whined.

 

“’S five o’clock in the morning. Not moving,” Killua said sleepily.

 

“How did you know it’s five o’clock?” Gon asked incredulously.

 

“Built in something. Dunno. Shut up and cuddle me.”

 

Gon considered it. It was certainly tempting just to stay in bed for the rest of their time on the ferry – it would dock that evening, and he had no idea where they would spend the next night. But he was restless, unhappy at what the past day had amounted to in terms of rediscovering nen, and he didn’t think that he could fall back asleep. He climbed out of bed and pulled on clothes.

 

“I’m going running, Killua. Meet you for breakfast.”

 

“Running?” Killua asked groggily. “Where?”

 

“The deck,” Gon said. Killua only groaned in response. Gon kissed him on the temple, tucked the covers up to his neck, and then closed the door quietly behind him.

 

No one was up so early in the morning, and so he had the deck to himself as he began to run laps around it, nodding at the crewmembers he passed on his way. About five laps in, he began to notice that one of them was staring at him every time he passed. Part way through his tenth lap, the man stepped in front of him. “You’re in the way,” he said gruffly.

 

Gon stopped, panting, his hands on his knees. “Sorry,” he said. “I’ll try to stay further back.”

 

The man smirked. He was older than Gon, maybe in his early forties, with straggly grey hair and a nose that had been broken more than once, small, slitted eyes and a thin but wiry body. “You won’t be out of my way until you’re off this ship. You and your albino freak of a boyfriend.”

 

Gon stood up. “What did you just say?”

 

The man looked slightly nervous now, but there was no hesitation when he said, “Well it’s all true, isn’t it?”

 

“Why do you care about us?” Gon asked.

 

“Does that matter?” the man grated, pulling Gon into a stranglehold.

 

“Let me go!” Gon growled, twisting in the man’s grip. He might not have his hatsu back, or even have control of his nen, but he had always been stronger than average and he hadn’t forgotten how to fight.

  
Except the next moment, there was a knife at his throat. “Stop fighting. Unless you want that white-haired freak weeping over your corpse?”

 

Gon was steadying his breath, preparing to try to throw the man off when all at once, he was gone – skidding across the deck until he crashed into the gunwale. Gon looked up and around to see several other crew members watching, wide-eyed, and Killua a few feet away from him, his aura blazing and eyes dark with fury. For a moment he thought that that was all – that it was over. It _should_ have been over, if this were any ordinary fight, by virtue of Killua’s nen-enhanced strength. But the sailor with the ratty hair was rising, and to Gon’s horror, there were slabs of aura standing out around him like sharp outgrowths of crystal. Gon couldn’t tell if it was some modified type of ren or the beginnings of a hatsu, but either way this man was clearly powerful. In which case, what was he doing working as a deckhand on a provincial ferry?

 

Before Gon could consider this further, the man broke one of the crystals off and flung it at Killua, who dodged it even as he spun out an arc of electricity between his fingers. More of the crystal daggers flew from the sailor as Killua approached him, face white with fury. Gon could only watch, desperate to hurl himself into the fight and knowing with a sinking despair that he would only get in Killua’s way. When Killua was close enough, he pitched a bolt of blue-white electricity at the sailor, but aside from cracking the crystals, it did no real damage. Gon could tell that this shook Killua – his lightning strike almost always paralyzed his opponents on the first try. But the other man’s crystals seemed to be shielding him.

 

Gon got to his feet, watching with dread as Killua flung a much larger bolt, which still didn’t seem to touch the man. Worse, it seemed to have depleted Killua. Gon hadn’t seen him charge himself since they’d got on the ship. Then he had a worse thought: what if the power that Gon seemed to be absorbing from him was weakening Killua? Guilt and rage built in him, aura pouring out of him uncontrolled as Killua dodged a dozen crystal missiles. One of them grazed his arm, and when Gon saw the blood begin to well there, while Killua tried to summon his lightning and barely managed a trickle, everything in him overflowed. Killua couldn’t get hurt again because of him.

 

With that conviction, his aura arced outward in a way that he’d never felt it do before. He hadn’t moved, hadn’t even lifted a hand, but he saw it hit Killua like a wave. For a moment Killua rocked with it, looking at him, his face showing confusion and the beginnings of hurt. The next moment, a shudder ran through him and the tiny flicker of electricity between his hands surged until he had to spread his arms wide to contain it, a pulsing, pale blue mass too bright to look at. Without hesitation, he flung it at the crystal-covered man. His glittering shell shivered to pieces, and he was left stunned and cowering as Killua stalked toward him.

 

“Now,” Killua said, his voice low and dangerous, “explain exactly why you threatened my friend?” He was already drawing out another lightning bolt, wide and blinding as the last one.

 

“A mistake,” the man was muttering, clearly shaken from the blast. It was a miracle that he was still standing, Gon thought – the crystals must have been quite a powerful shield.

 

“What do you say, Gon?” Killua asked, not taking his eyes off the man – or dropping the lightning.

 

Gon approached carefully until he stood beside Killua. It was beginning to dawn on him what had just happened, and he wasn’t sure that he could speak without his voice shaking. But he sounded steady enough to himself when he said, “I say he needs to tell us who planted him here.”

_“What?”_ Killua and the sailor asked at the same time, and Gon had to laugh. Had Killua honestly not figured this out? There was no reason for the sailor to have picked such a stupid fight with him, unless he was testing him to see what he would do about it. To gauge his strength. He must have been watching their nen exercises the entire time they were on the ship.

 

“Tell us who sent you to look for us,” Gon persisted, “or you can find out what that lightning feels like without any ren in between.”

 

“I don’t know his name,” the man said after a long silence. “But he was strange. Long, black hair. Black eyes.”

 

Gon and Killua exchanged a look as the man began to edge away from them. “Are we done here?” he asked.

 

“As long as I never see you again.”

 

The man ran. When he was gone, Killua drew a shaky breath and looked down at the transmuted aura he still held. “Gon, what did you _do_ to me?”

 

“I…I don’t… _did_ I do that to you? That weird lightning?”

 

Killua shrugged. “I think you must have. I was out of charge. My own stupid fault, I haven’t topped up since we left your aunt’s. But then something just hit me, and it came from you, and now I have this.” He nodded at the buzz of blue.

 

“Well,” Gon laughed nervously, “it came in handy, didn’t it?”

 

Killua looked at him, a question in his eyes. “It did. But now I can’t re-absorb it.”

 

“What?”

 

“It’s too much. This is more aura than I can contain.”

 

“Ahhh…” Gon said, worry seizing him anew. Had he hurt Killua after all?

 

“Is it yours?”

 

Gon concentrated for a moment, and then he said, “No. Mine’s all here.”

 

Killua laughed, molding the electricity into a ball. “Well, I think maybe we know what your new hatsu is.” Gon watched as Killua flung the ball far out to sea, and then two more before the electricity finally retracted into him. He turned to Gon. “And I think we need to talk.”

 

6

 

“But how can I be an enhancer _and_ an emitter?” Gon asked between bites of omelet in the ferry’s restaurant.

 

“Well, it was always possible to learn to use more than one nen ability.”

 

“But not to use them equally well. And not both at once.”

 

Killua sighed, looking into Gon’s worried eyes. He understood his anxiety: what he’d just done shouldn’t have been possible, and it had made Killua wonder what other unpredictable turn his nen might take. No doubt Gon was wondering something similar.

 

“The thing is, Gon,” he answered finally, swirling the melted remnants of a few chocolate chips that had escaped his pancakes around his plate, “nothing about this should really be possible, beginning with your nen coming back in the first place. But it has, and strange as it all seems…I mean, the way you lost it wasn’t exactly normal either. So why should it come back in any normal way?”

 

“But I have no idea how to control it. I don’t even know how I did it. Out there, earlier – it just _happened.”_

“Mmm,” Killua said with narrowed eyes, “but did it?”

 

“Well I know I didn’t plan it.”

 

“No, but thinking back on it, it makes sense. The first time around, you pretty much learned nen intuitively. Isn’t that also what happened in that fight? You saw that I was in trouble. You wanted to help me. That intention triggered your new hatsu.”

 

Gon shook his head. “And so my new hatsu is…enhancing _your_ hatsu?”  

 

“Mine, clearly. But maybe others’ too? We’ll need another nen user we trust to test that. Which is to say we won’t be testing it till we get to Leorio and Kurapika’s.”

 

“Kurapika,” Gon said, his eyes suddenly intense. “He can do something a little like this.”

 

“What?” Killua asked, startled. “Since when?”

 

Gon shrugged. “I don’t really know the details. It’s part of how he wore himself out on the Dark Continent expedition. But Leorio said something about him using that dolphin chain on his index finger to…kind of…borrow other people’s nen abilities. Either to give them to himself or someone else. But it only works only for a little while. And it saps his life force.”

 

Killua considered this. Then he shook his head. “I don’t think that’s what’s going on with you. For one thing, you didn’t take anything. You gave.”

 

“It’s still messing with someone else’s abilities,” Gon said dubiously.

 

“It is,” Killua agreed, “and so you’ll have to learn to control it, and also think about consent, if you can do it for anybody at will. But still, I’d hate for you to be afraid of it. _I’m_ not. To be honest,” he looked up, captured Gon’s eyes with his own, “I think that it’s a kind of redemption. Or I mean, that’s how I hope _you_ think of it.”

 

“Redemption?” Gon asked slowly.

 

“Yeah. Don’t take that the wrong way. I mean, don’t take it as judgment.” He paused, and then sighed. “Gon – you lost your nen because you were hell-bent on revenge. It consumed you. It…” Killua stopped to draw a breath, hoping that he wasn’t about to break Gon’s heart; but this needed to be said. “It hurt people who loved you. Including me.”

 

Gon’s face fell, his mouth was tremulous. “Killua,” he said miserably, “you know I’m sorry – ”

 

“I do know,” he said. “And I told you that I never blamed you. Yes, it hurt me, but I know why you did what you did.” Gon looked ruined, his eyes teary. _Shit, this was_ not _what I wanted._ “Gon, you have to forgive yourself.”

 

“I don’t know if I can,” Gon said. “I just…can’t stop feeling it. Guilt. It’s always there in my mind, at least a little bit. It has been ever since Nanika woke me up.”

 

“So,” Killua said, trying not to flinch at the mention of Nanika’s name, “maybe that’s the point of this new ability.”

 

“How?”

 

“Think about it. It’s basically the complete opposite of the one you lost. It’s selfless by definition. I don’t see how you could ever use it the way you used your last one. Sure, there’s always a way to twist things when it comes to nen…but you would have to change an awful lot to use this ability to hurt your friends. You would have to intend it. So maybe this is how you learn to forgive yourself.”

 

“Redemption…” Gon repeated speculatively, turning his nearly finished glass of orange juice in anxious hands.

 

“It’s time to let it go,” Killua said, leaning forward and taking one of Gon’s hands, lacing their fingers together.

 

“I…can try.”

 

“And I’ll have your back while you try. I won’t let you fall again, Gon. I promise you that.”

 

“Killua?” Gon said, his golden eyes molten as they caught Killua’s, his voice almost lost in the hum of conversation around them. It was low, and it shook a little, and all at once Killua knew what was coming. There was a twist in his guts, and he couldn’t tell whether it was apprehension or anticipation.

 

“Yes, Gon?” he said.

 

“I love you,” Gon said, lower still, but his voice was warm and deep and Killua had no doubt that he meant his words with the same earnest certainty that Killua had felt watching him sleep the previous night. “And, ah, you don’t have to say it back – ” Gon added, clearly beginning to panic when Killua said nothing.

 

Killua knew then that it wasn’t apprehension he felt. He tossed a handful of jenny on the table, and then he pulled Gon up, dragged him out the door of the restaurant and toward their cabin.

 

“Killua, what are you doing?”

 

In response, Killua pinned Gon to the wall. “Saying it back,” he said, and kissed him. “The way I see it,” he said, coming up for air, “we only have a few hours left before the real world takes over again. And I don’t want to spend them sparring.” Gon searched his eyes, and then broke into a grin, and it was all either of them could do to let go of each other long enough to reach their cabin and lock the door.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alluka finds an ally. Gon and Killua face some crap. Plus, ants. So, you know, the same-old same-old! ;-) Sorry I'm scraping this one in just under the midnight wire!

**Former Republic of East Gorteau**

 

The next time Joji came with food for Alluka, Illumi stood behind him, and Joji wouldn’t meet Alluka’s eye. In fact, it was as if he was unaware of her presence, his eyes flickering blankly over her even as she stepped toward him, though the bird clearly saw her. It fixed its bead-black eyes on her and didn’t drop them until Illumi shut the door behind them. When Alluka heard the last lock click shut, she let Nanika out.

 

They had been practicing their separation and re-convergence, and despite having no one to guide them, it was getting steadily easier. Likewise, Nanika’s independent form was strengthening, solidifying, and she could move farther and farther away from Alluka without the sudden, jarring snap back into her host. She could change shape and size in a flicker, and she’d even travelled outside of the tower, under cover of darkness, condensing herself until she could slip through the bars of the tiny window. In this way she’d confirmed what Alluka had suspected: the tower was part of a half-ruined castle in a thick forest, apparently abandoned except for Illumi, Joji and his bird.

_Illumi’s brainwashed him, hasn’t he,_ Alluka said, picking at the bland food: bread and some kind of vegetable stew.

_I believe he has,_ Nanika said. _The boy didn’t look afraid. He didn’t look like anything._

 

Alluka sighed. _Which means there’s a needle in his brain. Any chance of us getting it out?_

_It is possible, but it would be very difficult. We would have to learn where it is, and then we would have to subdue him long enough to get to it, and of course, removing it would leave a mark. Illumi would know._

 

Alluka shook her head. _What are we going to do?_

 

Before Nanika could answer, there was a flurry of motion at the window. Nanika flung herself back into Alluka, knocking her backward, but it wasn’t Illumi spying on them. Not unless he’d learned to take the form of a magpie, and Alluka was fairly certain that no number of needles could change Illumi _that_ much. She scrambled to her feet as the bird fluttered into the room. It landed gracefully a few feet in front of her, dropped a tiny piece of rolled paper at her feet, and then let out a raucous “ _CRAAA-A-AK!”_

 

Alluka blinked at the bird and the paper for a few moments, wondering if this was some kind of trap Illumi was leading her into. But then the bird hopped forward and started pecking at her bare feet (Illumi had taken her shoes, along with any other piece of clothing that he thought might be useful if she tried to escape).

 

“Okay, okay!” Alluka cried, and picked up the scroll of paper. When she did, a long, fine golden needle dropped out of it, and pinged on the floor. She picked it up and examined it. There were dried spots of blood on it. She set it on the windowsill, and then unrolled the paper. The bird watched as she read what was on it…and then sat down and read it again. It said:

 

“Your brother put something into my head last night when he thought I was asleep. Miyako pulled it out. Enclosing it. This is Miyako. We don’t trust him. But he watches. If you want to talk to me, do it through her.”

_Nanika?_ Alluka asked.

_I think it is safe,_ Nanika said. _She is only a bird._

 

At that, Miyako squawked and reached again to peck Alluka’s feet. “Will you stop that!” Alluka snapped at the bird, leaping out of the way, but at the same time she had to wonder: had the bird heard her unspoken words?

 

Nanika separated from her, taking the form of a dragon she had admired in one of the picture books they’d often read when they were imprisoned in the Zoldyck dungeon.

 

“Stop that,” Miyako repeated, looking curiously at Alluka, who had frozen. Nanika was equally still by her side, but the bird didn’t seem fazed by her sudden appearance.

 

“You…can talk?” Alluka asked, scanning the room quickly: looking for Illumi.

 

“Can talk?” Miyako said.

_Corvids are known to have the ability to mimic many sounds, including human speech,_ Nanika said, letting out a puff of blue smoke.

_Does she know what she’s saying? Does she understand me?_ Alluka asked, side-eyeing the bird.

_She understands. But not the way you understand._

_Then how do we know whether or not to trust her?_

_We cannot know that. But it does not seem likely that Illumi would send you a note this way._

_Unless he wants us to trust Joji, and tell him our secrets._

_He knows that we are smarter than that._

_What should we do?_

 

Nanika floated up to the ceiling and circled it, lying on her back like a swimmer in a swirling current, her dragon’s tail switching back and forth. She stayed there, drifting in meditative ellipses for some time before she returned to Alluka’s eye-level. Miyako was rummaging under one wing with her beak when Nanika finally answered. _We should talk to him._

_Okay. And say what? And for that matter, how? Illumi hasn’t exactly left me with writing implements, and Joji didn’t send one._

_He did,_ Nanika contradicted.

 

At first, Alluka was puzzled. Nanika couldn’t lie – apparently none of her kind could, which made sense, really, given that they dealt in absolutes. But there was clearly no pen or pencil in the bare, square room, nothing with which to make a pigment…except…oh.

 

“Lovely,” Alluka said aloud, but she returned to the window where she’d deposited the needle, and picked it up.

 

“Your master is a sadist,” she said to Miyako. Then she pricked her index finger with the needle, waited for the blood to well, and then wrote in crimson on the back of Joji’s note, “Send a pencil.” She blew it dry, rolled it up and offered it to the bird, who took it carefully in her beak. And then, with a flutter, she was gone.

 

**The Road to Hispania**

1

By the time the ferry docked that evening, Gon and Killua’s cabin was a wreck of tumbled and twisted sheets, room service trays and dishes, and more than one scorch mark from the places that Killua’s lightning had hit when Gon had eventually convinced him to help practice his new ability. Their conclusion at the end of that session: Gon’s new hatsu was extremely powerful, and he had no idea how to control it.

 

“Maybe you aren’t meant to,” Killua had said, stroking Gon’s head as he lay on his lap when they’d finally given up.

 

“That doesn’t make sense. A nen user always has to control their hatsu.”

 

“Yeah,” Killua had said, “but I mean, if yours is tied to someone else’s, then it’s also up to them to control it.”

 

Gon had frowned. “That doesn’t seem like it would be too useful in the middle of a fight. What if they don’t know I can do it? And suddenly they just get dumped with a shitload of power they weren’t expecting and have never practiced with?”

 

Killua hadn’t been able to help laughing then.

 

“What?” Gon had asked indignantly.

 

“I’m still getting used to you swearing!”

 

“Killua. You must have noticed I’m not all that innocent anymore.”

 

Killua had arched an eyebrow and said, “No, you really aren’t,” and then slid his hands down Gon’s sides until he gripped the hard muscles of his ass, and squeezed them, and that had been the end of that discussion.

 

An hour later they’d gotten up and showered, putting on the last of their clean clothes. Now they surveyed the destruction of the cabin. “Maybe we should just throw it all in the sea.”

 

Killua laughed. “I think the crew might object. And I’d really rather not fight them again with everyone watching, even if you can give me mega-lightning.”

 

“I still feel bad,” Gon said, looking doubtfully at the mess.

 

“Well, this should take care of it,” Killua said, and pulled a clutch of jennys from his pocket, placing them on the bedside table.

 

Gon still looked dubious. “I guess?”

 

“Don’t worry about it, Gon. We’re never going to see this ship again…at least, I hope not. Now we have to get moving.”

 

So they did a last check for stray belongings, and then left the cabin for the deck, where people were already gathering to watch the port approach.

 

“You know, I’ve never been here?” Gon said, as the ship crossed into the enveloping arms of the harbor.

 

“What – to Frera Harbor?”

 

“No. To this continent.”

 

Killua was about to express surprise, but then he reconsidered it. Of course Gon wouldn’t have been here – they hadn’t come here in their travels together, and Gon couldn’t have had much money or time to travel widely since then. “It’s pretty,” he said. “And the food is good. Especially the chocolate!”

 

Gon laughed as the ship maneuvered toward a crowded dock. “Now I know why you wanted to come here.”

 

Killua smiled, but he said softly, “I guess I don’t need to say that there’s going to be a lot more work and less play from now on.”

 

“I know that.”

 

Killua could hear him desperately trying to keep the dejection out of his tone, and so he took Gon’s shoulders, turned him gently to face him. “Gon…don’t misunderstand me. Even with Alluka missing, these have probably been the best few days of my life.” Gon brightened, meeting Killua’s eyes. In the deepening light, Gon’s eyes were the color of sun shining through a glass of tea. Killua melted. “No, not probably. Definitely the best.”

 

“I love you so much,” Gon said, leaning into him.

 

Killua wrapped his arms around him, kissed his thick hair at his temple. “I love you too. More than I have words for. And Gon…” He pushed him to arm’s length, looked him in the eyes. “I’m so, so sorry for deserting you.”

 

“It’s okay,” Gon said. “I understand why, now.”

 

“Do you?”

 

“Yes. The same reason. You didn’t have words.”

 

Killua gave a rueful laugh and kissed Gon’s temple again. “Oh, I had them. I was just too terrified to say them. And that’s not okay. It will never be okay that I cut you off like that because I was too much of a coward to own up to loving you – but I can at least promise you that I’ll never do it again. So whatever happens next…remember that.”

 

There was no time to say more, as the ship was docking. But Killua held onto Gon’s hand as they disembarked, the crowded melee of the pier daunting after their days on the ship absorbed in each other. They stood for a moment, a little patch of stillness amidst the chaos.

 

Then Killua said, “Come on. I have the names of a few decent boarding houses. Let’s hope one of them has rooms free.”

 

2

 

None of them did. It turned out that there was a local festival happening and all of the accommodations were filled. So, after dinner in a pub by the port (Killua ordered the only thing on the menu that wasn’t fish, an odd kind of stew that Gon ended up finishing for him) they found a park with an abundance of soft grass and wild thickets of trees and vines for cover.

 

Gon couldn’t help but feel the shift in Killua’s focus now that they were back on land. He knew that Alluka had returned to the forefront of his friend’s mind, and although it made him a little bit sad for the lost, wild abandon of the past few days, he hadn’t been unprepared for this. But he managed to convince Killua to take off his shirt before they slept, and so at least he could lay his head against his beloved’s warm skin under their shared blanket, fall asleep to the metronome of his heart.

 

*

 

The next morning they washed in a little stream that ran through the copse of trees by which they’d slept, and then walked back into town in search of breakfast and transport north. It would be two days’ journey by car to the coastal village of Estril where Leorio and Kurapika now lived. It would have been faster by train, but Killua didn’t want to leave the paper trail that would have ensued on either of them using their Hunter licenses to borrow money from a local bank, and they had been extravagant on the ferry. They needed to conserve money now.

 

This led them to the town’s central marketplace, where they bought breakfast and then split up to see if they could find transport to the northern coast. It took Gon less than an hour to secure a ride to the mid-point of Hispania, the country next to Leorio’s. She was a middle-aged wool-spinner who kept flocks of sheep and goats in the hills just outside the capitol, bringing her wares to market in the larger port cities a few times a year.

 

“Are you sure about her?” Killua asked Gon when they re-convened for lunch at a shack selling some kind of stuffed pastries, which were remarkably good, given their bland appearance. “I mean, what if she’s a plant, like that sailor?”

 

“She’s not.”

 

“How do you know?”

 

Gon shrugged. “She smells honest.”

 

Killua shook his head. “Is your nose ever wrong?”

 

Gon considered this. “Not so far.”

 

“Okay,” Killua said, sipping from the bottle of juice they were sharing. “Wool lady it is.”

 

“We’re supposed to meet her at four, when the market closes. So…what do you want to do until then?”

 

Killua smirked. “Gon, your poker-face is nonexistent.”

 

Gon pouted. “That’s not nice, Killua. And anyway, what do you mean?”

 

Killua rolled his eyes. “I mean, you might as well have come right out and propositioned me. And no,” Killua said when Gon’s look turned hopeful, “I am _not_ going to fool around with you in some alleyway.”

 

“So…what, then?”

 

“We are going to practice your hatsu in some alleyway.”

 

Gon sighed. “Okay.”

 

*

 

Luckily the old town was full of twisting, forgotten pathways between buildings, and they spent four solid hours practicing Gon’s control of his aura as he used it to enhance Killua’s. By the end of it Gon was as exhausted as he would have been if they’d spent all of that time sparring. However, he’d gotten better at directing the surge of power as he launched it at Killua, so that it no longer hit him like a rogue wave.

 

He also realized that he could shape it, widening or narrowing it, which would no doubt be useful in a fight with multiple opponents. He could control its velocity, at least to an extent, and by the end of the afternoon he was beginning to have at least a sense of how to control the quantity of aura he sent out. He wasn’t as certain of this, though. It was possible that it was only the effect of his weariness.

 

“It’s almost four,” Killua said at last, handing Gon a water bottle. “We better go find our ride.”

 

Gon swallowed most of the water in a few gulps, wiping sweat from his forehead. “Okay,” he said, handing the bottle back so that Killua could drink. “Just give me a minute.”

 

Killua’s look turned to one of concern. “Are you all right? Did I push you too hard?”

 

Gon smiled, his chest warming at the look in Killua’s eyes. “I’m fine. Just tired.”

 

“Well it paid off,” Killua said, slinging his rucksack over one shoulder and Gon’s over the other. “Your control is so much better already. And I didn’t have to get rid of as much extra aura as the last time we practiced.”

 

Gon nodded as they began to walk back toward the town square. “It still feels weird, though. To not be doing anything directly.” Killua didn’t answer, but he put a hand on Gon’s shoulder, and Gon was grateful for it.

 

The sun was hovering over the terracotta rooftops by the time they reached the square, its rays long and golden. They bought bread and cheese and fruit and chocolate from a few market stalls that hadn’t yet closed, and then Gon led Killua to the place where the spinner was loading the last of her unsold wares into the back of a battered red van. She was small and wiry, with weathered skin and a mass of long, gray, wavy hair pulled back with a loop of purple yarn. When Gon greeted her, she looked up and smiled.

 

“I was beginning to think you might not come back,” she said.

 

“Sorry,” Gon said. “We lost track of time, and then we stopped to buy food. Killua, this is Disa. Disa, this is Killua.”

 

The woman looked Killua up and down with keen, hazel eyes and then she said, “Killua doesn’t trust me.”

 

Gon laughed. “Killua doesn’t trust anyone…not at first, anyway.”

 

“Gon!” Killua snapped, glaring at him.

 

Disa snorted laughter. “Probably wise. But we have a long drive for him to get over that. Either way, pleased to make your acquaintance,” she said to Killua.

 

“Likewise. And don’t listen to Gon,” Killua answered. “He has no verbal filter.”

 

Gon punched him in the arm, and Disa laughed. “I would say that’s a very _good_ reason to listen to him. Anyway, we should get going. The earlier we hit the mountains, the better. There’s no backseat, so who wants shotgun?”

 

“I’ll take the back, at least for a while,” Gon said. “I mean, if you don’t mind me sleeping there. I could use a nap.”

 

With a knowing smile, Disa turned to Killua. “You planning to join him? I promise to keep my eyes on the road, as long as you don’t mess with my goods.”

 

Killua shot her a dark look, blushing furiously, and Gon laughed behind his hand. “I’ll take the front,” Killua said grimly.

 

“Suit yourself,” Disa said, her eyes dancing. She opened a creaking door that looked like it had at some point been hit by something large and heavy, and got in.

_“Gon!”_ Killua hissed as Gon reached for the handle of the back door. “You _cannot_ leave me alone with this person!”

 

“Sorry, Killua,” Gon said, exhaustion graying the edges of his vision. “But I really need to sleep. Wake me up in a few hours. And, you know, try to be nice?”

 

Killua rolled his eyes at him, but he opened the front passenger door as Gon opened the back door and crawled into the space between the front seats and the crates of wool. He pulled out his rolled blanket to use as a pillow. He was asleep before Disa even turned the key in the ignition.

 

3

 

The van gasped and choked enough to make Killua hope that it wouldn’t start and they could find another ride, but just as he was about to suggest it, the engine rumbled to life. Disa gave him a triumphant smile, as if she knew what he’d been thinking, and pulled out of the square fast enough to make Killua clutch his seat. She took the twists and turns of the little roads with equal abandon, and Killua gritted his teeth, trying not to think about the mountains she’d mentioned.

 

“So,” Disa said, when they’d finally cleared the town and were on a straight-ish patch of highway, “how long have you two been together?”

 

Killua looked away from the dry, scrubby red landscape he was watching through the window, tensing automatically, as if readying for a fight. But then he made himself calm down. After all, what she was asking was intrusive, but not inaccurate. More to the point, since he and Gon were really together now – boyfriends? Ugh, he needed a better word – then he was going to have to be able to talk about it. Field questions about their relationship and no doubt, at times, defend it.

 

“I guess that depends on what you mean by ‘together,’” he said at last.

 

“Whatever you want it to mean,” Disa said, swerving around a pothole in the road so sharply that the tires screeched.

 

Killua considered how to answer this in a way that wouldn’t prompt her to probe deeper into the origins of their relationship. He didn’t particularly want her to know that they were Hunters. “Almost five days,” he said at last, and he couldn’t resist a smirk when he saw her eyes widen in surprise.

 

“Really?” she asked. “You just seem…” She shook her head. “You seem to know each other a lot better than you could after five days. I would have said years, and my intuition’s always been dead on. Guess I’m getting old,” she sighed.

 

At that, Killua relented. “Okay, you’re right. We’ve known each other for years. The five days is…I mean…” _Shit. What_ did _he mean?_ He had too many words for what Gon was to him now, and also none – or none that he would say to a stranger.

 

“It’s okay,” Disa said, her voice and smile suddenly gentle. “I understand. It’s why I agreed to give you the lift,” she continued, startling Killua into looking at her. “I’m a sucker for young love.”

 

Killua had to chuckle at that. “All right. What did he tell you?”

 

“Nothing, really. He just said that he and his boyfriend were looking for a ride north.”

 

_Boyfriend it is, then._ Killua sighed

 

“But it was the _way_ he said it,” Disa continued, with a musing look, her eyes on the ghost of a mountain range hovering on the horizon. “He wasn’t just proud of it. He was incandescent. Like the sun was shining out of him. And it was shining for _you._ You don’t see that kind of love every day.”

 

All at once, Killua was back in that hotel room where Gon had been recovering after Pitou had ambushed the two of them and Kite. That had been the first time he’d had any real understanding of the strength and recklessness of rage that Gon was capable of. He remembered the near-paralyzing fear that he’d been trying so hard to control as he watched Gon sleep: the abrupt and terrible possibility of a life without him. He also remembered the light that had poured out of Gon later, when Gon had told him that Kite wasn’t dead.

 

That, he realized, was the moment he’d known that he was utterly, hopelessly in love with his best friend. Later, when it had all come to pieces, he’d pushed that knowledge away, buried it deeply. It was simply too painful to think about. Yet even if Gon hadn’t unraveled, they’d both been far too young to have known what to do with a love like that. Killua could easily believe that their separation was the only road by which they could have come together as they were now.

 

Through all of those years, though, that love had been there, a tiny, flickering votive candle in Killua’s heart, waiting for Gon to fan it into flame. Waiting for Killua to muster the courage to let him.

 

“I guess not,” Killua said, and they lapsed into contemplative silence.

 

4

 

Killua hadn’t thought that he was tired, but their practice that afternoon must have worn him out in ways he wasn’t quite aware of, because the next thing he knew, he was opening his eyes to an ink-blue sky mapped with stars, his cheek pressed to the van’s cool window. Gon was chattering away to Disa, who was laughing at whatever he was telling her.

 

“Ahh, Killua, you’re awake!” Gon cried when Killua sat up. “Here, you must be hungry.” He shoved something into Killua’s hand, which, on inspection, turned out to be a roughly constructed sandwich filled with cheese and apples. Disa was eating a similar one.

 

“Thanks,” Killua said, although he was barely awake enough to register whether he was hungry or not.

 

“You missed the sunset,” Gon said as he constructed another sandwich. “It was so pretty, Killua! We were already in the mountains, and the sky was a million colors, and the colors stayed on the sides of the mountains even after the sun was set. And look – you can see snow!”

 

Killua took a bite of his sandwich and peered out the dusty windshield. It was true. They were high enough in the mountains now that the peaks were snow-covered, gleaming silvery blue in the crisp moonlight, the rocky slopes below them a subtler slate shade.

 

“I guess you won’t have seen much snow since you went home,” Killua said after a moment, looking back at Gon, who was chewing enthusiastically, his eyes the white-gold color they turned in the moonlight. Killua had to fight the sudden, powerful urge to grab him and kiss him. He looked away quickly, glad of the darkness that hid his blush, although he couldn’t shake the uncomfortable sensation that Disa knew exactly what he was thinking, given the sidelong look she gave him.

 

“None,” Gon confirmed when he swallowed. “It never gets cold enough to snow on Whale Island.”

 

“Gon,” Killua warned.

 

“What?” Gon asked, obviously honestly puzzled.

 

“He thinks you shouldn’t have told me where you come from,” Disa answered for him.

 

“Gon?” he asked, glaring back at him. “What else have you told her?”

 

“Oh, don’t get your panties in a twist,” Disa laughed. “All he’ll tell me is that you’re going to visit friends in Estril.”

 

“Gon,” Killua sighed.

 

“Well she already knew that, Killua,” Gon protested. “I mean, I had to tell her when I was looking for rides.”

 

“Didn’t we agree to keep the actual destination a secret until we got closer?”

 

Gon looked sheepish. “But I _told_ you she was honest.”

 

“Honest people can still point the wrong people in our direction.”

 

“Boys, I am _not_ going to – ” Disa began, but she never had the chance to finish. Something large and winged swooped out of the moon-blue shadows and landed on the hood of the van, making it shudder. Disa screamed and swerved and then, when the thing didn’t move, she slammed on the brakes. The van screeched to a halt inches from the flimsy guardrail running along a dizzying drop.

 

Gon was already on his way out the door. Killua stopped long enough to say, “Stay here, Disa,” before he followed him.

 

The creature whirled on Gon and Killua as soon as they alighted from the van. It was an ant, a big one, resembling some kind of beetle with armored, iridescent outer wings and transparent inner ones, all four of them raised as if it meant to take flight again. It had clawed hands and feet, arms and legs with too many joints, and long, fang-like protrusions from its mouth that were dripping something no doubt venomous. It snarled at them.

 

Killua’s ren was already strong around him, his lightning fizzing between his fingers. He could sense Gon’s ren too, strong enough to protect him, but he could also feel Gon recoiling from the sight of the creature. If he’d had more time to think, he would have told him to stay with Disa. No doubt Gon hadn’t faced an ant since he killed Pitou, and Killua was grimly aware that this was going to affect his ability to fight one now. He could only hope that Gon would pull it together enough to help him rather than hinder him.

 

Killua called on his Godspeed, and he was able to hurl himself at the ant before it could take flight. He battered its face and chest, sending lightning zinging through it. It stumbled, jags of blue light running along the perimeter of its wings. Killua danced behind it while it was disoriented, preparing to blast its wings in earnest. But just as he got set to throw a bolt at it, he heard Gon cry out. The next instant strong arms grabbed Killua’s shoulders and flung him toward the guardrail and the empty space beyond.

 

For a wild, weightless moment he hovered between sharp, too-bright stars and a dark and jagged death. Then his arm flew up and he caught the guardrail with a single hand. Looking up, he saw Gon in fighting stance, and he was no longer facing down the single ant, but three. One looked like a hybrid of some wild cat, the other disturbingly like the Zoldyck’s old guard dog, Mike. They had formed a triangle around Gon by the time Killua managed to kick up over the guardrail and back into the fight.

 

With Whirlwind, he managed to infiltrate the triangle, but he knew that he couldn’t fight off three ants at once, and they were closing in. Killua spun on a heel, blasting them all with electricity, but there was only so much it could do when he couldn’t stop to concentrate on one of them at a time. They fell back for a moment, their tight group loosening.

 

Killua hissed, “NOW would be a good time to use that new hatsu, Gon!”

 

“Yeah,” Gon said, sounding too dazed for Killua’s liking. A moment later, though, Killua felt the surge of energy push through him, and the lightning in his hands exploded into that hot-white beam he remembered from the ship. He hurled a ball of it at the cat creature that was crouching to pounce, its glowing red eyes fixed on Gon. It flipped over twice, landing on its back, twitching as veins of electricity flickered over its body.

 

“Finish it, Gon!” Killua yelled, and watched long enough to see Gon pull a knife from his boot and unemotionally slit the ant’s throat as it lay incapacitated. Then he began sawing through its neck, clearly intending to separate the head from the body. Killua was glad to know that Gon hadn’t forgotten Kite’s lesson from his fight with the centipede, though it made his throat tighten to think about what Gon must be remembering. _Not now._ He made himself face the other two.

 

They had clearly been rattled by Killua’s heightened aura, but they also weren’t backing down. The beetle lunged at him, mouth wide and fangs dripping, but Killua dodged it easily. The dog was more difficult, prowling the perimeter of the fight like Mike had patrolled their property when Killua was small. It lunged at Killua every time he tried to attack the beetle.

 

And Killua couldn’t deny that he wasn’t at the top of his game. He’d let his guard down those days on the ferry, but it was also difficult to focus a killing rage on that creature that looked so much like his old dog – his childhood friend. His _only_ friend before he met Gon. This ant had Illumi written all over it, and he wondered if his brother had actually bred it specifically to unhinge him. _Get it together, Killua!_

 

Drawing a breath, he set up as if to attack the beetle again but then, in a move too quick for the ants to follow, he launched himself at the dog and straddled its back, closing lightning fingers around its throat. It let out something between a growl and a whine and tried to shake him off, but Killua hung on, and once again he felt Gon’s aura infiltrating his own, strengthening him. Not only did he keep his seat on the lunging animal, he kept his hold on its throat long enough to send his wildly boosted aura straight through it. It screeched and then fell, twitching.

 

Killua was about to leap away from it when it rolled, pinning him to the cracked asphalt. He felt it digging into his back and shoulders, tried to shove the weight of the creature off of him, but whatever will it had left seemed to be focused on keeping him down. His breath was shallow, his arms trapped under him, unable to call the lightning. _Fucking hell,_ he thought, _this_ cannot _be how this ends. How I end. How Gon and I end…_

 

With that thought, he felt the weight lift from him, and he caught a flicker of Gon’s eyes, blazing, intent, his mouth fixed in a curl of rage as he picked up the dog-ant and flung it over the guardrail. Killua heard it howling as it fell for what seemed like an eternity, and then, at last, nothing. He wanted to lie there and just melt into the relief of still being alive, but Gon was reaching down, grabbing his arm and jerking him to his feet. The beetle was almost on them, its wings spread wide and the glint in its faceted eyes murderous.

 

“Help me do this, Gon?” Killua asked as he brought his lightning back into control.

 

“Always,” Gon said at his back.

 

Killua felt the push of Gon’s aura like a blow, given how close he was. But the light between his hands arced, and he felt the thrust in his speed. As the creature lunged to sink its fangs into him, he shot away and then returned, the bow of lightning caught around the ant’s neck like a garrote. He pulled, and it choked, clear venom and viscous black blood spilling onto the ground at Gon’s feet.

 

“Get away from it, Gon!” Killua cried as he pulled tighter and the ant began to shake on its legs.

 

“No,” Gon said, his eyes intent on the dying beast and his expression dangerous.

 

“That venom could kill you, you idiot!” Killua yelled, as the ant bucked and fought against him.

 

“I need to see it die,” Gon said with quiet, cold conviction.

 

Killua wasn’t sure he liked this statement, but they were where they were. With one more jerk, he severed the beetle’s head. It toppled to the ground, the head rolling to a stop by Gon’s feet. Gon smiled down at it – a cruel smile – and then he reached for it.

 

“Gon, don’t – ”

 

But Gon had already picked the thing up by its antennae, and was hurling it over the guardrail. Then he picked up the body, and did the same. Killua sighed, hoping to hell that Gon hadn’t poisoned himself, and that the attack hadn’t triggered something terrible in his friend. Before he could ask him, though, the van door opened.

 

“What,” Disa asked in a trembling voice, “the hell just happened?” She stood looking from one of them to the other.

 

“I…um…” Killua began, and then stopped, not knowing how to continue. He looked at Gon.

 

“We’re Hunters,” Gon said with neither equivocation nor apology.

 

Disa laughed without much humor. “I think I got _that!_ But those things…were they chimera ants? Why were they here?”

 

“They were,” Killua sighed. “As for why they were here…let’s just say my brother doesn’t like me very much, and he has a lot of resources at his disposal.”

 

Disa regarded them critically, hands on her hips.

 

“If you want to leave us here,” Gon said tentatively, “we won’t blame you.”

 

Disa laughed ruefully. “Now that I know that my van’s a target? I don’t think so! Get back in, and start explaining!”

 


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Alluka solidifies some alliances, her hatsu comes into play, and she sort of maybe develops a crush.

**Former Republic of East Gorteau**

1

 

When Joji arrived the next morning, Illumi was still with him, and the boy looked as blank as he had the last time. After they’d left, though, Alluka prodded through the food Joji had brought her, ultimately finding a stub of a pencil baked into a bread roll, with a slip of baking parchment wrapped around it. On it he’d written, “I’m sorry! No more blood! Tell me what would help you?” She had to smile.

 

Flipping the parchment over, she wrote, “Get me out of this tower and give me a map.” Then she hid the pencil and paper in cracks in the wall’s crumbling mortar, as she’d hidden the needle. She ate her breakfast with an eye on the window, waiting for Miyako to appear. But the window remained empty of everything but hazy blue sky and clouds.

 

After a time, Alluka grew restless. She let Nanika out. _Where is the bird?_ she asked her.

 

_Perhaps Illumi is watching her._

Alluka sighed, envisioning a quick end to what had seemed a promising alliance.

 

_Do not be sad,_ Nanika said, running foggy fingers through Alluka’s hair. It felt like runnels of winter wind, and Alluka shivered. _He cannot watch all the time._

_Waiting is terrible. Not knowing what he might be planning for Gon and Killua…_

_Why don’t we practice? Take your mind off of it._

_All we can practice is separating and re-integrating, and I’m not sure how much better at that we can really get._ Of course, they could practice some of the sparring moves Killua had taught her, but she was sore and cramped from sleeping on the hard floor. And while she’d tried to keep up her strength and flexibility, it was difficult in the tight space.

Nanika shrugged. _There are many other things that we could practice. Play catch?_

Alluka looked once more at the window, and then she said, _Okay, why not._ It was a game that she’d originally played with Killua to sharpen her sense of an opponent’s position without seeing them, but once she and Nanika had learned to be awake together, and later, to separate, he’d encouraged them to play it together, because Nanika was so much harder to locate. Alluka stood up, stretched her limbs, and walked to the center of the room. She took off her headband and wrapped it around her eyes, and then she stood very still, steadying her breathing. She felt the dark tide of Nanika’s nen retreat until it seemed to disappear.

 

Alluka listened: there was nothing but the soft sigh of breeze through the window’s bars. Of course, Nanika hardly made any noise, but as she’d gained solidity Alluka had become adept at hearing the faint hitch in the wind as it caught at her and she resisted, or the brush of her misty form against something solid. Right now she could hear nothing. Just as she’d learned to hear Nanika’s faint sounds, though, she’d discovered that she could feel the slightest chilly slipstreams from her movements. And so she began to move, knowing that in that small space, it would force Nanika to move too.

 

As she paced a slow circumference of the room, she thought she felt the tail end of one of these drafts against her cheek; but it turned into a whisper of wind, and she decided that she’d been mistaken. Abruptly she lunged across the room, hoping to force Nanika into flight if she came close to her, but there was nothing.

 

_You know it’s not fair if you hide on the ceiling,_ Alluka said.

 

There was a shiver of silent laughter. _I’m not on the ceiling._

Of course there was no way for Alluka to locate Nanika from a disembodied voice. She’d hoped, though, that speaking to her might shake her zetsu enough for Alluka to sense a direction. But it was a long shot, and she wasn’t surprised when Nanika’s zetsu held firm. She was beginning to wonder whether Illumi had rattled her enough, and she’d lost enough training time, that she couldn’t win this game anymore. The thought brought a twist of panic to her chest.

 

_Stop it,_ she told herself, and forced her breathing to calm again. Once more, she stood still and listened. This time she heard something: it was so close to the breeze between the window bars that she wasn’t quite certain, but there was a gradient of solidity to it that wind never had. Inwardly she smiled, but she kept herself still until she was certain. Then, she whirled on a toe and lunged toward the window, its position as clear in her mind as if she could see it. She caught the tail end of Nanika’s drifting form as she tried to slip away.

 

Nanika laughed her delighted shiver of a laugh into Alluka’s mind as Alluka pulled off her blindfold and cried, _Gotcha!_

_See? You have not forgotten what you’ve learned. Illumi only wants to make us think so._

_I didn’t know you heard that._

_I did not have to hear it. I can feel you worrying._

Alluka sighed, re-tying her hairband. _There’s nothing to do here but worry._

_Play catch again?_

_No,_ Alluka said. _I don’t really –_

There was a sudden flutter at the window, and Miyako settled between two of the bars. Alluka ran to her and reached out when she saw that the bird held another little scroll in her beak. Miyako dropped it into her upturned palm. She unrolled the paper and read the message Joji had written on it. It was short, and it made the panic rise in her all over again.

 

“Your brother is going to start cutting your rations. He’s also watching Miyako.”

 

Alluka looked away from the scrap of paper, out the window, wishing that she could slip through it as easily as Nanika or the magpie. She knew that Illumi wouldn’t actually starve her to death. She also knew that weakened enough, she wouldn’t be able to help Killua, and would likely be one more burden on him. Never mind that it might make it impossible for her to hold Nanika within her.

 

“Shit,” she said out loud, and then she shook her head, and retrieved the paper that she’d hidden earlier. She added to the message, “If my brother manages to weaken me, it will be deadly for us all. I HAVE to get out!” She considered adding more, but really, there was nothing more to say. She rolled the parchment, handed it to Miyako, who took it delicately in her beak, and then flew away again.

2

Joji had been correct – over the next few days the quantity of Alluka’s meals was greatly reduced, as was the quality. It was very nearly the proverbial bread and water: clearly chosen to reduce her muscle strength as well as her physical stamina. She lost more heart when those days went by without a visit from Miyako.

 

Then one day Joji came without Illumi. She opened her mouth to speak to him, but he shook his head quickly, his eyes panicked, pointing toward the doorway, and set down the tray of food. There was nothing on it in which he could have hidden a note, only a bowl of viscous porridge and a bottle of water. Alluka ate the porridge and resigned herself to another day of crushing tedium, but Joji had barely been gone fifteen minutes when Miyako flew through the window bars.

 

This time she didn’t stop, but landed right by Alluka’s feet (which she quickly tucked under her, out of range of that sharp beak) and dropped a scroll, larger than any of the others had been. Alluka opened it as Miyako began to peck at the dregs of her porridge.

 

“I’m sorry I took so long to reply,” the note began. “I think your brother trusts now that I’m under his control, but he still watches. I don’t have a map, but we’re in the former Republic of East Gorteau, in an old Hunter hideout. As for letting you out, I wish I could, but I can’t. I’m sorry.”

 

Alluka groaned in frustration. She hadn’t expected him to throw the doors open for her, but she’d thought he’d offer something to help her escape. “Your master is useless!” she said to the magpie.

 

Miyako cocked her head. “Useless,” she repeated, and Alluka couldn’t tell whether or not she imagined the humor in the bird’s tone.

 

“Do you understand me? Or have you just learned to repeat words?” she asked.

 

Miyako only stared at her. Alluka sighed. “Utterly useless,” she said, dropping the note disdainfully on the floor, expecting the bird to fly away – possibly with the unanswered note in her beak. But instead, Miyako pushed the paper back toward her.

 

“What?” Alluka grumbled. “What am I possibly meant to say to that?”

 

Miyako croaked and nudged the paper again. This time, the scroll rolled over, and Alluka saw that there was more writing on the back. She snatched it up, read the rest: “But I think that we may be able to talk in the next few days. I can explain then. Don’t write back. Swallow this message.”

 

_Swallow it?_ “Is Joji insane?” Alluka asked the bird.

 

“Joji insane,” Miyako said contemplatively.

 

Alluka couldn’t repress a giggle. The bird had finished the porridge, and was looking at her expectantly. “What? I don’t exactly have food to spare, and you look pretty well fed.” Miyako blinked, pecked at nothing on the floor. “You can go now,” Alluka sighed. “I don’t have a message for you.” Miyako looked up at her again. Alluka huffed in exasperation. “No message!” she said firmly.

 

“No message,” the bird agreed, but made no move to leave. She was watching Alluka. _Waiting?_

 

“No message,” Alluka repeated softly to herself, considering the paper and what to do with it. It was very fine, nearly translucent, like tissue paper but more pliable. All at once a memory formed: a moment from her very early childhood, before her family had learned to fear her. Perhaps before she could even speak, and make that a possibility.

 

Killua had been eating sweets – gorging on them, no doubt because he’d stolen them. They were something foreign, probably a gift from one of the family’s clients, or maybe something their father had picked up on his travels. They had attracted Alluka because of their bright wrapping paper. She’d reached out and Killua had given her one, its covering a searing magenta. She’d fumbled it open with baby fingers, and then looked at it, puzzled, because the white oblong in her hand had seemed to be wrapped in another layer of paper.

 

“Rice paper,” Killua had told her, popping one into his mouth, the white paper still wrapped around it. “You eat it.”

 

Alluka hadn’t particularly enjoyed the sweet – it was strange, insipid, nothing like the chocolate that Killua usually gave her – but the novelty of eating paper had been enough to make her swallow it. Now, she took an experimental bite off the edge of Joji’s note. Sure enough, it melted to nothing on her tongue. She had to smile, if ruefully, at Joji’s ingenuity.

 

“Okay,” she said to Miyako and stuffed the paper into her mouth, chewed and swallowed. “Gone!” she said, holding up her empty hands.

 

“Gone,” Miyako said with approval, and in a flicker of black and white and teal, she was indeed gone.

 

Alluka let out a long breath, and settled in to wait.

 

3

 

Two more days passed before Joji entered the tower and instead of setting down Alluka’s tray and leaving, he shut the door behind him. Joji stood regarding Alluka for a moment, as if worried that she might scream or fly at him or simply disappear into thin air. When she didn’t move, he approached, and set the tray down beside her. She raised her eyebrows: it wasn’t a plain bowl of porridge this time, but a full meal, possibly the best she’d seen since Illumi had brought her here.

 

“Please, sit,” she said. “Though I can’t offer you much in the way of furniture.” Joji sat on the hard stone floor in front of her. She picked up a thin strip of grilled meat. She was about to bite into it when Miyako fluttered down off of Joji’s shoulder and jabbed at her hand so that she dropped it. Alluka let out a startled yelp as Miyako flew off with her prize.

 

“Miyako!” Joji admonished, and then he looked at Alluka’s bleeding hand. “I’m so sorry!” he said. “She doesn’t normally do things like that.” Alluka only looked at him skeptically, sucking on the puncture wound. “Here, let me see it,” Joji said, reaching out.

 

Reluctantly, Alluka offered him her hand. He took it in his own: a beautiful hand, she couldn’t help but notice, with long, fine fingers. He closed them over the wound, and she felt her skin warm and tingle. When he let go, her skin was smooth and perfect again. She looked at him in surprise.

 

“You’re a healer!”

 

Joji smiled, and Alluka was suddenly riveted. He wasn’t a particularly handsome boy, but that smile lit up his face, worked itself into every fiber and made him exquisite while it lasted. “I’m an emitter. Healing is my primary hatsu.”

 

“You have others?”

 

His smile died, and Alluka was left with an oddly empty feeling. “None that I much like to make use of.”

 

Alluka picked up another piece of meat, eyed it, and then eyed Miyako. The bird sat on the empty chandelier, ignoring her. “Why the food? Is this my last supper?”

 

He smiled again at that, though it didn’t quite have its former brilliance. “Of course not! I just thought I’d take the opportunity to give you something decent while your brother’s away.”

 

Alluka dropped the meat, scrambling to her feet and heading for the door. “He’s away? For how long? How far did he go?”

 

But Joji had stood too, his expression panicked. He plastered himself against the door. “No – Alluka –wait!”

 

“I can’t wait – you don’t understand – if he’s gone, I have to get out _now!”_

“Alluka,” Joji said, reaching out as if to take her shoulders, to steady her – but then he stopped short, let his hands fall. “You can’t. This is what I came to explain to you.”

 

“I _have_ to!” she cried, trying to push past him. “Joji, Illumi must have warned you that I’m dangerous. Well I am. _Very_ dangerous. Right now he can’t control me, but soon he will be able to, and – and – gods, it’s so complicated!” Alluka shut her eyes, trying to stifle her emotion. She was trembling hard, and her voice shook when she spoke again. “Just, please trust me. Nothing that he could do to you or to anyone else comes close to what would happen if he could control me.”

 

“I’m sorry,” Joji said, and Alluka felt his ren shimmer out around him. “I can’t let you out. My mother…she’s sick…too sick for me to heal her. She can’t run from Illumi. She can’t even leave our house. He said that if you managed to escape, he would consider it my fault, and she would pay.” His own voice was unsteady, his green eyes dark. “The ants killed my father. It was only the three of us. She’s all I have left, and I’m all _she_ has left.”

 

“I’ll take you with me,” Alluka said. “Both of you. You and I can both use nen, we’ll find a way to bring your mother with us, and once we find my brother Killua – ”

 

Joji was already shaking his head. “I’m no kind of fighter, but even if I were, my mother refuses to leave.” He hesitated, glancing up at Alluka and then down again at his fidgeting hands. “Believe me, I’ve tried. But my father is buried here. She – she knows she won’t live much longer, and she made me promise to bury her next to him. I can’t betray that promise.”

 

For a moment, in the face of such pure, potent love – the same kind of love she felt for Killua – Alluka wavered. A wish for healing didn’t carry a price. If she let Joji wish his mother back to health, then maybe she _would_ be willing to run, and maybe he _would_ help Alluka escape. She could even make it the condition of healing the woman. Maybe that was blackmail – it certainly wasn’t the kind of ultimatum she’d ever imagined making – but she was desperate, and in many ways it felt kinder, cleaner than the alternative.

 

But what then? Even if she could trust Joji to keep Nanika’s abilities secret, word would almost certainly get out when Joji’s mother miraculously recovered from her fatal illness. Something would tie it all back to her, and to avoid being caught and exploited she and Nanika would have to use their power. They would have to force wishes and – no. The price was simply too high. Better to use her hatsu.

 

Alluka gathered herself, gathered her aura and focused on Joji. She let herself feel the kaleidoscopic flow of his emotions. There was the love for his mother, a soft lilac. Most of the other rainbow strands were unidentifiable, given how little she knew about him. But then there was another – a strong, pulsing streak of teal. Miyako, she realized. His love for his bird was more powerful than she would have imagined.

 

She insinuated herself into the mix, filaments scrolling between the swirls of color, weaving a net. She infused them with the violet dye of sympathy, the scarlet of desire, and watched Joji carefully to see what would happen. His cheeks flushed, and he looked at her carefully, then away again. She’d practiced this enough times to know what was coming next, and she prepared herself to rebuff him, to change her message to revulsion if need be.

 

But he only said, slight hurt in his tone, “Please don’t do that.”

 

She blinked at him for a moment, and then retracted her aura. “Do what?” she asked as innocently as she could.

 

“Manipulate my emotions,” he said, not meeting her eyes.

 

Again, Alluka was speechless. How had he known? No one had ever figured it out before – and it wasn’t a common hatsu. Killua had told her he’d never encountered it before. “What makes you think I was – ”

 

“Don’t treat me like an idiot! I may not have your pedigree, or your brother’s Hunter license, but my father taught me well. I can tell when an aura is manipulating me.” He looked up at her at last, clear green eyes meeting hers. “Is this why your brother told me to be careful of you? What exactly can you make people do?”

 

Alluka blinked at him for a moment longer and then she slid down the wall, bursting into tears. “Please, _please_ don’t tell Illumi about this!”

 

Joji regarded her for a confused moment, and then he approached her carefully, crouched down in front of her. “You mean – he doesn’t know your nen ability?”

 

Alluka shook her head. “And he can’t ever know it! He would find a way to make me use it to hurt people.”

 

“I…” Joji began, and then stopped, and then began again. “Of course I won’t tell him. But to be honest, I’m not really seeing how your ability could be much of a threat to him. He’s the most powerful nen user I’ve ever met, and he always has his ren up around you.”

 

“My hatsu is the least of it,” Alluka said dismally, picking at the food on the tray. She wasn’t particularly hungry anymore, but she needed to buy time to decide how much to tell him, and the best way to do it.

 

Joji sat back down, studied her closely again, and she had the uncomfortable feeling that he was seeing into her. At last, he said, “You mean the ghost.”

 

Startled, Alluka stared at him. “Ghost?”

 

“Spirit?” Joji asked. “I don’t know the right word for it. I only know what it looks like, and ‘ghost’ is my best guess. Except that it lives in you, so it really can’t be a ghost, can it?”

 

Alluka barely breathed. “What have you seen?”

 

“Only what Miyako has shown me.”

 

“Miyako?” Alluka asked, confused.

 

“She…we…” Joji stopped, shook his head. “Animals sort of…speak to me. They can show me what they see. But Miyako most of all, maybe because she’s been with me so long. She was a baby when I found her. She hardly had any feathers. A hawk had destroyed her nest, killed all of the other chicks, but she was still alive.” He stopped, his eyes drawing back from the past to look at Alluka. “But she’s shown me that – well, whatever it is that lives inside of you, and comes out when nobody’s looking.”

 

“She’s not an it!” Alluka said sharply. “Any more than Miyako is.”

 

Joji held up his hands. “Okay. Sorry. I’m just not exactly sure what to call her?”

 

Alluka sighed, relenting. “Nanika. And I guess, actually, you aren’t wrong. Because in my country’s language, her name just means ‘something.’”

 

“So you call your…her…‘something’?”

 

“I didn’t name her. My family did. And by the time I realized what an insult it was…” Alluka shrugged. “Well, she was already Nanika.”

 

“And what _is_ Nanika?”

 

Alluka smiled sadly. “She’s the twin of my soul. My best friend. She’s also a parasite from the Dark Continent called an Ai, who is very, very dangerous under the wrong influences. She’s…been with me almost since I was born.” Alluka could see Joji trying to make sense of this. She waited for the inevitable repulsion to shut him off from her forever. She wondered if there was any way to make him let her go before he told Illumi what he knew.

 

Instead, he said, “Can I meet her?”

 

Alluka was so startled that her hold on Nanika dropped for a moment, and in that moment Nanika burst forth, hurtling around the room in a ragged cloud shot with blue streaks before she settled on the form of a bird. She seemed to like imitating Miyako’s image, and now she fluttered down onto the floor beside her, a cloudy, bright-eyed double.

 

“Apparently she’s decided you can,” Alluka sighed. “Joji, Nanika. Nanika, Joji.”

_Nanika_ what _are you doing?_ she hissed at her.

_He wanted to meet me._

_But now he’ll tell Illumi!_

_He already knew about me,_ Nanika said, _and he didn’t tell._

_Fine,_ Alluka grumbled. It was true, after all, and there was nothing she could do about it now. _Just don’t scare him._

 

“Can she talk?” Joji was asking.

 

“Hmm? Ahh…she can, yes. But only to me. Or, well, through me.”

 

“Through you?” he asked.

 

“Yes. But that’s when things get dangerous. We don’t really do that these days.”

 

“You keep saying that you’re dangerous, and Nanika’s dangerous, but to be honest, neither of you _seem_ dangerous.”

 

Alluka sighed again. “But we are, and I can’t tell you how, because that’s what would make us dangerous to _you.”_

_Tell him,_ Nanika urged. _He could use it to help us._

_How? We can’t wish for ourselves, or make him do it. He already said he can’t let us go. And even if he could help us with a wish he made without our suggestion, we don’t know what the price would be. It’s too dangerous._

_He’ll find out anyway._

_Not if I can help it!_

 

Nanika spun herself into a tornado, twirling upward, and then settled in the depths of the ceiling to sulk.

 

“Did I do something wrong?” Joji asked.

 

Alluka laughed. “No. I did. She’s mad at me.”

 

“You were talking to her all that time?”

 

“Yes. We don’t use speech to communicate. I’m sorry, that must seems strange to you.”

 

“In some ways, I guess. But then it isn’t much different from what Miyako and I can do.” All at once, Joji looked up, his eyes keen with concern. “Your brother’s coming back. I have to go.”

 

“How did you know?” Alluka asked. She couldn’t sense Illumi’s aura at all.

 

Joji smiled. “My nen. But that’s a story for another day.”

 

“You mean you’ll come back?” Alluka asked, aware that she sounded pathetically eager. She didn’t really care.

 

Joji looked puzzled. “Of course I will. Why wouldn’t I?”

 

“I tried to manipulate you, you know about Nanika, and then…” She bit her lip, uncertain how much to tell him.

 

“And then?” Joji asked.

 

Alluka sighed. Better to get it over with. “I know that Illumi told you I’m his brother. You have to be wondering about that.”

 

Joji gave her another long, incisive look. At last, he said, “Do _you_ consider yourself his brother?”

 

“No,” Alluka said. “But you should probably know – ”

 

“Alluka,” Joji interrupted gently, his eyes intent on hers, “I know everything that I need to know about you already.”

 

“What?” she asked, confused.

 

“You are a kind, intelligent, brave young woman in a terrible situation. And for future reference, you don’t need to use your nen to make me want to help you. I can’t just let you out, but I _will_ find a way to help you.”

 

Alluka felt tears in her eyes again. “Thank you.”

 

Joji smiled at her – that beautiful, blinding smile. And then he was gone, and she was sliding down against the wall again, heart pounding erratically and her mind in a whirl. Nanika, back in bird form, fluttered down and settled on Alluka’s knee.

_I think,_ she said, _he likes us._

_Quite possibly,_ Alluka said.

_And I think,_ she added with a quiver of laughter, _we like him._


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Gon works through some past trauma, and at long last you get the leopika/killugon reunion! Plus a little surprise. This chapter has some explicit sexual content, so if you don't want to know about that skip section 3. There is also some discussion about past suicidal tendencies in section 4, but they're long since overcome, not explicit, entirely based in canon and pretty important to characterization, so unless it's a huge trigger I would suggest not skipping that. Plus, a lot of laundry gets done.

 

**Hispania**

 

1

 

They drove through that night and into the early morning to get out of the mountains before they stopped to sleep, Disa handing over the wheel to Killua when she got too tired. Meanwhile, Gon and Killua told her as much as they dared to about their past and their current mission. She listened in contemplative silence, but when Killua admitted that his sister was in danger, she nodded and announced, “That’s it.”

 

“What’s it?” Gon asked sleepily. They were all wedged into the front seat together now, Gon in the middle, his head on Killua’s shoulder.

 

“I’m taking you boys to Estril.”

 

Gon sat up at that, and both he and Killua looked at her in surprise. “You are?” Gon cried, delighted, even as Killua said, “Why?”

 

“Killua!” Gon protested, glaring at him.

 

“I just mean, if I were you, I’d get rid of us as soon as possible,” Killua said.

 

Disa laughed. “I probably should. But Estril has a good market…and I also had a little sister.”

 

Killua heard the buried pain in her voice, and knew better than to question this. Instead he said, “Thank you. And now maybe we should stop? The road is starting to blur.”

 

“Then yes, we’d better,” Disa said. “There’s a side road up ahead with a decent campsite.”

 

Killua followed her directions to a small, grassy area by a stream, hemmed in by eucalyptus trees. “Should we set a watch?” Disa asked as they climbed out of the van and stretched stiff limbs.

 

“We’ll be okay,” Gon said. “Hunters sense danger in their sleep.”

 

She looked skeptical. “Okay, but I’m still sleeping in the van.”

 

“Fair enough,” Killua said, and he grabbed his and Gon’s packs before Disa climbed into the back with her own bedroll.

 

Killua spread his blanket on the ground. Gon sat down on it and pulled off his boots. Killua toed off his shoes and pulled the other blanket over them, and he filled with warmth when Gon snuggled closer and draped a leg over one of his. But although his tired body cried to him to shut down, let go, he couldn’t. He kept seeing the look on Gon’s face when he’d watched the dying beetle-ant, hearing the tone of his voice when he’d said that he needed to see it die.

 

“What’s the matter, Killua?” Gon mumbled.

 

“Why do you think something’s the matter?” Killua dodged.

 

“Cause I can hear you blinking. So you’re not sleeping. Is it because of the fight?”

 

Killua looked down at Gon’s face, tucked against his shoulder. He didn’t want to have this conversation. He knew they had to have it. “Why did you say that you needed to see it die?” he asked.

 

Gon groaned a little, but he opened bleary eyes to look at Killua. He blinked at him for a moment before he said, “I needed to know that it wouldn’t come back for us.”

 

“Gon…that doesn’t really make sense. Those weren’t the last ants in the world, and they probably aren’t the last ones we’ll face before we find Alluka.”

 

“I know,” Gon said softly, tracing the furrow of worry that Killua hadn’t realized had formed between his brows. “But they were the first ones I’ve fought since…”

 

“Pitou.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

There was a long silence. Killua closed his eyes despite himself at the soothing stroke of Gon’s fingers on his forehead. After a time, he said, “You’re afraid of them, aren’t you.”

 

“How do you know that?”

 

“You aren’t the only one who can sense things.”

 

Gon sighed. “Of course I’m afraid of them. I don’t want to be, but…they made me into someone you couldn’t love. Someone you wanted to leave.”

 

“Gon,” Killua said, curling his fingers in Gon’s hair, “I never stopped loving you, and I didn’t want to leave you. But we were only kids, and I was afraid, too.”

 

Gon was silent for a moment. “Are you afraid of me now?”

 

“No,” Killua said, and despite the doubt he’d had since that moment on the road, he meant it. That hadn’t been rage he’d heard in Gon’s cold request. It had been fear. “Never. And Gon?”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“It’s okay to be afraid of them. It also makes what you did back there one of the bravest things I’ve ever seen.”

 

Gon pressed his face into Killua’s chest; a moment later Killua felt the hitch of a sob. He knew that there was really nothing that he could say to make it better. That maybe these were tears Gon needed to shed if he was ever really going to put the past behind him. And so he closed his arms around him, and held onto him as he cried himself to sleep.

 

*

 

The rest of the drive to the coast was uneventful, although Gon wouldn’t stop complaining about how hot and flat and boring central Hispania was. Killua had to agree with him, but it didn’t help to hear it. As they approached southern Portus Cale, though, the landscape began to change, rolling hills and patches of forest breaking up the monotony. When they caught their first glimpse of the sea, Gon cried out in such delight that Killua had to laugh.

 

“I can’t help it, Killua,” he said, his eyes bright. “I never feel right when I’m not near the ocean.”

 

They arrived in the cluttered little port town of Estril early enough in the morning that Disa could join the market setting up in the town square. “Well, boys,” she said as they all climbed out of the van, “I suppose this is good-bye.”

 

“Oh – here,” Killua said, fumbling in his pockets and pulling out a handful of jenny. “For gas, and, well, everything.”

 

Disa regarded the handful of bills, plucked two out and pocketed them, then waved away the rest.

 

“That can’t possibly cover – ” Killua began, but she interrupted.

 

“The company has been priceless. And you’ll need all the money you have to find your sister. So keep it.”

 

“Thank you!” Gon cried, and wrapped Disa in his arms.

 

She laughed, and then pushed him away. “You’re welcome. Truly. You know where my village is, so if you ever come this way again?”

 

“Of course we’ll visit!” Gon said.

 

“We’d better get going,” Killua said, knowing that Gon would stand chatting all day if he let him.

 

Disa nodded to him, and then, apparently as an afterthought, she drew Killua into a hug, whispering into his ear, “Keep loving him, every single day. And Killua – I am praying for your sister.” Killua barely had time to nod before she was turning away, beginning to haul crates from the back of the van.

 

2

 

Leorio and Kurapika’s house was perched on a cliff overlooking a turquoise cove with a bright sickle of beach at its rim. The house was far more beautiful than Gon had described – and far bigger. It rose in three angular stories from its surrounding gardens, pristine white with bright terra-cotta roofs.

 

Killua raised his eyebrows as they stood at the wrought-iron gate. “So how did Leorio even qualify as a doctor so fast?” he asked. “Never mind get good enough at it to afford this place?”

 

“He did a lot of training on the expedition,” Gon said. “I know he took a lot of tests when they got back and he skipped a bunch of levels or whatever? But the house, well…I think they also got a lot of money for the expedition. I mean, Leorio never quite _said_ that…”

 

Killua laughed. “And you didn’t flat out ask him?”

 

Gon smiled sheepishly. “Yeah, I did. He wouldn’t tell me.”

 

“Gon,” Killua said, shaking his head.

 

Gon only shrugged. “So how do we get in there?”

 

“We could break in,” Killua deadpanned. “Or, you know, we could do what normal people do and call.”

 

“Right.” Gon pulled his phone from his pocket, and brought up the number.

 

Killua heard Kurapika answer after two rings. “Are you here?” he asked.

 

“Yeah – we’re outside the gate,” Gon said.

 

“Okay. Come in.”

 

Gon pocketed his phone, and the gate began to slide open. He stepped through onto a crushed shell driveway, and Killua followed him, hanging back slightly, uncertain of what kind of welcome to expect. Then he forgot his trepidation, because Kurapika was coming down the house’s front steps, and he looked like a ghost. White linen clothing fluttered around him, his chin-length hair was wispy and paler than Killua remembered, his grey eyes huge in a thin face. And he was holding a little girl by the hand. She was chubby, with red-brown pigtails and wide dark eyes, wearing a smudged blue dress.

 

“Gon,” Killua said in a low tone as Kurapika approached slowly with the dawdling child, “why is that child with Kurapika?”

 

Gon blinked at him. “Oh. Did I forget to tell you about her?”

 

Killua looked at him incredulously. “Yes, Gon, I believe you did forget to tell me that our friends of seven years _have a child!_ I mean, just – when? How?”

 

Gon shrugged. “They don’t say too much about that, except her parents died. She came back with them from the expedition. Her name is Liana.”

 

“Anything else you want to spring on me before – ”

 

But then Kurapika was sprinting forward, wrapping his arms around Killua. Although it caught him by surprise, the hug was a relief to Killua. Kurapika might not be as strong as he had been, but he was still warm and solid in Killua’s arms, and Killua breathed a sigh of relief.

 

“Killua,” Kurapika said, pulling back to look at him with a smile. “You grew up!”

 

Killua smiled and shrugged. “It happens?”

 

“ _This_ is who’s grown up!” Gon cried, picking up the child and swinging her around in rings over his head until she shrieked with laughter, and Gon caught her tightly in his arms.

 

Killua and Kurapika watched them for a moment, Killua in shock – Gon was good with children? – and Kurapika with a fond smile. Then, as Liana dragged Gon away, Kurapika turned keen eyes on Killua, who felt himself blushing, his eyes flitting around as if uncertain where to rest. But when Kurapika said, “Killua,” gently, they stopped their roaming, fixed on Kurapika’s.

 

“Kurapika,” Killua said, and he could still hear in his own voice how much Kurapika’s appearance had shocked him.

 

No doubt Kurapika had heard it too, but he ignored it. “I’m so glad to see you,” he said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “It’s been far too long.”

 

“I…I’m so sorry,” Killua began, but Kurapika waved the words aside.

 

“I think we all go far beyond ‘sorry,’” he said. “I still want an explanation, but for now come inside. You must be tired and hungry.”

 

*

 

After making them breakfast, Kurapika showed Gon and Killua around the house, Liana running ahead and chattering excitedly all the while. It was all air and light, white walls and minimal furniture. Killua couldn’t help feeling that the house had built itself around Kurapika, like a chambered nautilus’ shell around its inhabitant.

 

“Leorio built this place, didn’t he,” Killua said to him as they stood on a balcony on the top floor, looking out at the sea, while Liana showed Gon her collection of bleaching seashells.

 

Kurapika raised his eyebrows. “Did Gon tell you that?”

 

“I didn’t _know_ that,” Gon answered before Killua could. “I mean, I knew that the house was built for you two…but _Leorio_ built it?”

 

Kurapika laughed, a sound not unlike the wind chimes ringing gently on the balcony below. “Not literally. But he designed it. I mean, I told him the kind of thing I wanted, but most of this was him.”

 

Killua was struck by the tenderness of this. He wouldn’t have thought Leorio could be so refined, or so subtle in love. Because every detail of this house spoke to the extent of his love for Kurapika, but it whispered and hummed rather than shouted.

 

“Well,” Kurapika said at last, “Leorio couldn’t take the day off work, so he won’t be home until dinner time. You can do what you like until then. Although,” he added, giving the two of them a hard look, “I would suggest a nap.”

 

“I wouldn’t mind that,” Killua said. “We drove all night – our ride was determined to get here for the start of the market.”

 

“Bed sounds good,” Gon agreed, with excruciating eagerness.

 

Killua flushed, but Kurapika only laughed and then led them back down a flight of stairs, along a corridor to a door at the end. He looked at them with a cocked eyebrow and a knowing smile. “Am I wrong to assume that you’d like to share a room?”

 

“Da they’re _boyfriends!”_ Liana scolded. “They go in the _same room,_ just like you and Papa!”

 

Killua glared at Gon. “What have you been telling that child?” he demanded.

 

Gon shrugged. “The truth.”

 

Killua was still trying to decide how to respond to that when Gon grabbed him around the waist in a tight hug, winking at Kurapika. “And no, you aren’t wrong.”

 

“Gon,” Killua groaned, one hand over his face. “There is a child here!”

 

Kurapika laughed as Liana gave them all a contemptuous look, and then skipped away down the corridor, apparently disinterested in any more adult conversation. “Don’t worry, Killua. Liana doesn’t understand details, she only cares about people being happy. And I am sincerely happy for the two of you. We both are.”

 

“ _Both?”_ Killua croaked, looking daggers at Gon. “Gon, what did you tell them? _When_ did you tell them?”

 

Gon felt himself flushing slightly too, now. “Umm…when you were in the shower. The day after we first – ”

 

Killua clapped a hand over Gon’s mouth. Kurapika was laughing heartily now. “Thanks,” Killua told him. “We’ll take it from here.”

 

“All right,” Kurapika said. “There are clothes in the drawers if you need clean things, and the bathroom is stocked.” Then he retreated down the corridor after his daughter, still chuckling.    

 

3

 

When Killua woke, the light had changed enough that he guessed at least two hours had passed. It was warm in the room – too warm, really – even though he was naked. So was Gon, but they were wrapped so tightly together that the breeze from the open window didn’t provide much relief. Killua sighed, raking his fingers through Gon’s hair, his hand coming away coated in the red dust of the road they had traveled and slept on for the better part of three days.

 

The bed’s formerly pristine white sheets were a wreck. No wonder, really. It wasn’t just the road dirt. What had begun as an attempt by Killua to kick Gon’s ass for embarrassing him in front of Kurapika and Liana had turned into a wrestling match on said bed, which had rapidly devolved into kisses, and then utter madness. They hadn’t touched each other aside from the odd caress or stolen kiss during those days on the road with Disa. Though she’d more than given them privacy, it hadn’t quite felt right to be intimate with her so nearby, and so they’d been starving for each other, to the extent that a couple hours earlier, Killua had almost given in to Gon’s pleas to fuck him.

 

Now he was glad that he hadn’t. Maybe it was only one more little step in the grand scheme of things, but it still felt like an important one. It wasn’t something Killua had done with either of the men he’d slept with, and though he couldn’t quite articulate what the moment would look like, he knew that there was a moment he was waiting for. It was close, but it hadn’t shown itself yet.

 

He stroked his fingers through Gon’s hair again, and Gon murmured something in his sleep, rolling a little bit away from Killua. Watching him, Killua’s breath caught. He hadn’t had the chance yet to really look at Gon like this. The cabin on the ship had been too dark and cramped, and they’d never fully undressed on the road – only enough to wash perfunctorily in the odd stream.

 

Now, though, Gon was spread out and abandoned to sleep, open and vulnerable and so very beautiful in the soft afternoon light that Killua couldn’t help but drink him in. He was all twist and sinew and bright bronze skin, paler where he wore his shorts and the sun didn’t touch him. Killua wanted to follow the line from the bluish hollow of Gon’s hip to the beginning of the thick black hair at the crease of his thigh, but he held himself back, made himself just look.

 

The definition in Gon’s muscles was precise, even as relaxed as he was, a plum-colored tint running in the dips between their ridges. His eyelashes swept black brush-strokes on his freckled cheeks, his lips were pink and parted and swollen from kisses. He exuded power, even in sleep and…and shit, he was already hard again, his length draped over the black fuzz of hair at his groin. It wasn’t painfully hard, but it was enough to make Killua want to touch him again, and to make him reconsider what he’d denied himself earlier.

 

_Stop it!_ he told himself. He couldn’t face Leorio and Kurapika and their little daughter if he’d spent the entire afternoon getting off with Gon in their guest room, and if he stayed in here together any longer, that was what would happen. Reluctantly, he pulled away from Gon and stood up. Although no one was looking, he blushed to see his own cock standing at attention. _Shower. Cold one._ He couldn’t help kissing Gon’s cheek, though, and then, knowing exactly what he was risking, the tip of his cock, flicking his tongue across it. Gon moaned and shifted again, and it was all Killua could do to look away from him…but he made himself look away.

 

Drawing deep, steady breaths, Killua poked around in the drawers for clothes. There were more than he and Gon could have used in a month, and he had to smile, imagining Leorio shopping for them. He grabbed a few comfortable-looking pieces and then headed to the adjoining bathroom. He set the shower to cool, if not exactly cold, and then proceeded to scrub himself twice with the litany of bath products on display. When he finally felt clean, and a little bit more in control of himself, he turned off the water, dried himself and dressed.

 

Then he went back into the bedroom, where Gon was still fast asleep (and still hard, damn it!) He couldn’t resist kissing him on the shoulder, biting him gently, half-hoping that he’d wake up. But Gon didn’t shift this time, even if his cock did bob against his belly. _I am hopeless,_ Killua thought, tearing his eyes away. He dumped his and Gon’s dirty clothes from their rucksacks and gathered them in his arms, then left the room.

 

4

 

Luckily there was only one, central stairway in the house, and so Killua easily found his way down to floor level. He emerged into a large room he remembered walking through earlier – an open living space that took up most of the ground floor, with a sitting area and a dining area and a shining steel kitchen in the back. The sitting area was lined with book-cases and baskets of toys, and Kurapika was sitting cross-legged on one of the soft-looking couches, one pinky finger in his mouth as he stared down at a thick book on his lap.

 

“Sleep well?” he asked when Killua entered, and though Killua looked, there was nothing suggestive in his expression.

 

“Ah…better than the last few days. Where’s Liana?”

 

“She’s sleeping too.”

 

Killua had thought that she looked too old for naps, but then he remembered that this was a country where people slept away the heat of the midday. He felt a surge of guilt. “I hope you didn’t stay up for us.”

 

“No. I never took to the siesta habit.”

 

Killua nodded, and then looked down at his armful. “I’m sorry…we have a lot of laundry…can I…?”

 

“Oh!” Kurapika said, putting the book aside and leaping to his feet in the fluid motion that Killua remembered – even if Kurapika was otherwise nothing like he remembered. “Of course. Come with me.”

 

He walked toward the kitchen and Killua followed. Kurapika led him through a door into a room that held an industrial-size washer and dryer, along with a freezer and a deep soapstone sink and any number of other domestic luxuries. There was also a drying rack loaded with tiny dresses that made his throat constrict. He hadn’t known Alluka when she was Liana’s age, but he’d had to teach her how to wash clothing, and he remembered similar racks of drying dresses from the tail-end of her childhood.

 

“Killua? Are you all right?”

 

Killua snapped back from the past to see Kurapika standing by the open washer. “Yeah. Sorry. Still tired I guess…”

 

Kurapika nodded, but his eyes were too keen. Killua looked doubtfully at the armful of clothes, all of it stained some variation of the red dirt country they’d passed through.

 

“Just put it all in,” Kurapika said. “We’ll probably have to wash it again. Hispania dirt doesn’t come out easily.”

 

“Okay,” Killua said, and dumped the clothing into the washer. Kurapika added powder and set the machine running. “So. Tea, or something stronger?”

 

Killua laughed, shaking his head. “Strong doesn’t work on me, remember? I’ll have whatever you’re having.”

 

Kurapika gave him a half-smile and then led Killua to the kitchen, where he set a kettle on to boil and put tea bags into two cups. They said nothing as the water heated, and Kurapika poured it over the tea bags. He offered Killua a sugar bowl. “I trust your sweet-tooth hasn’t changed?”

 

Killua smiled, took the bowl, and added as much sugar to his tea as would dissolve in it. Kurapika watched him as he stirred it in, and then he nodded toward the sitting room and began to walk, the long, rumpled tails of his white linen tunic trailing behind him like wings. It unsettled Killua. It looked like Kurapika was drifting away, and a sharp pang of guilt and sadness hit him.

 

Kurapika sat down where he had been before, and then gestured to Killua to sit beside him. “Just say it,” he said.

 

“Say what?” Killua asked, startled, as he bent to take a sip of tea.

 

“You’re horrified by me. By what I’ve become.”

 

Killua blinked at Kurapika for a moment, and then he set his cup down. “Why would you say that?” he asked softly.

 

“Because I’m not the Kurapika you knew.”

 

“I could say the same about myself.”

 

Kurapika smiled, sipped his tea and then said, “No, Killua. You looked hell in the face and stepped back from the edge. That’s who you are, and it hasn’t changed. But me?” he sighed. “I threw myself in head first.”

 

“As far as I can see, you’re still here,” Killua said.

 

Kurapika looked at him with raised eyebrows, and then he chuckled. “Touché. But you don’t know the whole story.”

 

“Then tell me.”

 

Kurapika cast his eyes down at his teacup. “I am forbidden from telling you what happened on the voyage to the Dark Continent.”

 

“Don’t dodge me, Kurapika. You know what I’m asking.”

 

Kurapika looked up at him, his grey eyes wide and clear and enigmatically, unnervingly different than they had been. “All right. I’ll tell you what you want to know, if you’ll do the same in return.”

 

Killua considered it. There was a lot that he didn’t much want to tell Kurapika. But on the other hand, he wanted to know what Kurapika had been through – and truth deserved truth. “Deal.”

 

Kurapika sipped his tea, then set it down, took a deep breath and looked at his old friend. “I almost killed myself.”

 

“You…what?”

 

“I…” Kurapika sighed. “I was so intent on the eyes, so intent on revenge, I didn’t care about my own life. I used myself up, knowing exactly what I was doing. A part of me longed for death, and I would have died, except…”

 

“Leorio,” Killua filled in.

 

Kurapika nodded. “We were on the Dark Continent by then. Everyone thought that I was beyond saving. I was no kind of bodyguard anymore. I couldn’t even move. I lay in bed on that god-awful ship and I felt myself dying. And then Leorio was yelling at me.”

 

Killua had to laugh. “I hope he was. But why not before it got to that?”

 

“Oh, he yelled at me before that, too. But as long as I could function, I didn’t listen.”

 

“And once you couldn’t function?”

 

“He started shoving things down my throat. Into my veins. Needles, feeding tubes.” He waved a dismissive hand. “First it was just fluids, and ordinary medicine, I think? To be honest, I don’t know. But I do know that it wasn’t helping. And then it turned into something else. Something strange, and thick…” Kurapika stopped, appeared to consider his words. “I began to get better,” he said, his eyes on his tea mug. “But it took a long time. We were already on the way home when I finally had enough strength to ask what it was that saved me.”

 

“And what was it?” Killua asked, sipping his sugar infusion.

 

“Rice,” Kurapika said.

 

“ _Rice?”_ Killua spluttered. “I thought Gon must have been wrong about that.”

 

“It was a special kind of rice,” Kurapika said. “It only grows on the Dark Continent. It reverses aging…which I had rather accelerated.”

 

Killua scrutinized him. “So what exactly did it do to you? I mean, I know it saved your life, but I think there was a cost. Because you’re right. You’re different. Almost…almost like you’re not entirely _here.”_

 

Kurapika shrugged. “I was dying, Killua. If you see a difference in me, I would think it’s more due to that than the stuff that saved me. What I did to myself before Leorio dragged me out of hell, so to speak.” He sighed. “I can’t ever be what I was, but still, I’m grateful for what I am. What I have now. And if this hadn’t happened?” He gestured to his bird-boned, white-clad form. “I might never have ever had any of this. I might never have known love, except as a faded memory. And that would have been the greatest tragedy of my life.”

 

Killua met Kurapika’s eyes. “You love them that much?”

 

Kurapika smiled a sweet, secret smile, his pale cheeks pinking. “Yes, I do. Leorio and Liana…they taught me just how precious life is. They gave me another chance at it. Made me see it differently. Made me want just one more day, every day, to be with them. But I don’t think I need to explain that to you. You already know what it’s like to love like that.”

 

“I love Alluka more than anything…” Killua began, and then his voice broke, to his mortification.

 

“Except Gon,” Kurapika said, laying a delicate hand on Killua’s shoulder. Killua couldn’t speak. He could only look at Kurapika and nod, overwhelmed by all that had happened in the past few weeks. “And he loves you. It’s clear as day. Killua – it’s okay to love them equally.”

 

“How can I?” Killua asked, his voice snagging on emotion. “How can I even think about him when she’s in so much danger?” He dropped his face into his hands, but Kurapika pulled them away, tilted his chin up with slim, pale fingers.

 

“Because he’s your light, Killua. In my clan, they were sacred, and they were called heartmates. Gon is yours. He always has been. Don’t make my mistake, Killua. Fight for your sister, by all means. But let Gon fight with you, and never, ever let go of what you keep in your heart for him. You looked at hell? Well, he went there. And he came back for you.”

 

“It was Nanika who saved him.”

 

“Nanika was the means. But he came back for _you!_ Never doubt that.”

 

“What if…what if I can’t save her?” Killua asked, barely above a whisper.

 

Kurapika sighed. “I think you will, Killua. But if you can’t, don’t sacrifice Gon to that fire.”

 

“I…Kurapika – ”

 

A door opened and then slammed shut, cutting him off. “Hey Pika! Are the kids here yet?”

 

Kurapika smiled at Killua, brushed his cheek with his thumb, and said, “Let yourself love him, Killua, and you’ll be all right – no matter what happens.” Then he called, “In here, Leorio!” The next moment, Killua was enveloped in a hug – this one from long, black-clad arms.

 

“ _Killua Zoldyck!”_ Leorio cried, his voice louder than Killua remembered. “You have been AWOL for much too long! We are going to open a bottle of wine, and you are going to tell me _everything!_ Wait!” Leorio looked over the rims of his glasses – no longer the tea shades of his Hunter exam days, but square wire-rims that Killua was fairly certain came from a very expensive designer. “Where is Gon?”

 

Killua was about to explain that Gon was sleeping when Gon emerged into the sitting room, clean and dressed and carrying a bundle of dust-stained sheets, Liana tailing him like a besotted puppy. “Here!” Gon chirped, and Killua wanted to sink into the floor. True, the pink on the sheets was only road dirt, but Killua was horrified to think what else someone might find if they happened to look more closely. To Killua’s further mortification, Leorio rushed to hug Gon, dirty sheets and all.

 

“Let me take those,” Kurapika said, reaching for Gon’s armload.

 

“No, please – ” Killua cried, lunging toward them.

 

“Pika, you shouldn’t – ” Leorio said, grabbing for them at the same time.

 

“But we got them all dirty and – ” Gon began, before Killua tackled him.

 

And that was how four estranged friends found themselves in a tangle on top of a pile of questionable laundry, laughing until they cried, crying until they laughed again, a child giggling like a hysterical cherry on top.

 


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Gon takes his new hatsu for a proper test-drive, Killua finally learns the location of his sister, and much angst ensues. But also some soul searching, and a few important promises - and then, yep, some pretty heavy smut. So again, if that's not your game, you'll want to skip section three. Oh and I'm working on a little leopika spin-off to this chapter, hoping to post it half way through the week, so if you're a leopika fan too keep an eye out for that. It's called "On the Tip of Your Tongue" and it's distinctly nsfw!

**Estril, Portus Cale**

1

Leorio made dinner for them, a local specialty that involved chicken and fish, though for Killua’s sake, he left out the fish. “But if you’re going to be here for a while,” Leorio said as he stirred a large saucepan, sleeves rolled up and one hand in his pocket, “you’re going to have to get used to fish.”

 

“Gotta get used to fish,” Liana agreed from her position on Kurapika’s lap, shoving some kind of fish-shaped crackers into her mouth. Leorio moved from the stove to kiss her cheek. She wiped it off.

 

“I mean, I _can_ eat it,” Killua said doubtfully.

 

“And I can eat slugs,” Gon said, sipping his glass of wine, “but I don’t really _want_ to.”

 

“Gon!” Killua cried.

 

“Yeah?” Gon asked, clearly confused.

 

“The pinky swear! You made us say slugs! That does _not_ count as a condition if you know that you can eat them!”

 

“Well I couldn’t say what I _really_ wanted the condition to be.”

 

“Oh?” Leorio asked, looking over his shoulder with a raised eyebrow and a half smile. “And what was that?”

 

“Leorio,” Kurapika said warningly. “Liana.”

 

Leorio laughed. “You can tell me later, Gon.”

 

“Or, you know, he could _not_ ,” Killua said, taking a gulp of wine, although he knew that it would do little to soothe his embarrassment. Nor did it help when Gon slid close to him on the bench that ran along the kitchen table and planted a sloppy kiss on his cheek.

 

“I’m sorry, Killua,” he said. “I know I say everything wrong.”

 

Killua softened a bit, though he still rolled his eyes. “You don’t say everything wrong, Gon. You just say _everything._ To everyone. _All the fu-_ ah. Freaking. Freaking time.”

 

Leorio laughed again. “I’m glad to see you two haven’t changed. Well,” he amended, “at least not where it matters. I don’t think I could stand it if Gon got subtle or Killua lost his snark. Or if you both got too old and serious to banter.”

 

“But Killua isn’t really snarky,” Gon said. “I mean, he is, but he’s also sweet. At least he is when it’s just us.”

 

“Not much chance of Gon getting subtle, as you can see,” Killua said dryly.

 

“And on that note, dinner is served!” Leorio boomed proudly, setting the saucepan on a mat Kurapika laid out in the middle of the table. He also took a loaf of warm bread from the oven and set it in a basket beside the pot. Then he and Kurapika sat down, and Leorio said, “Help yourselves.”

 

Gon and Killua ladled heaps of stew onto their plates and took several slices of bread each. Leorio took a healthy portion, but Kurapika took only a little. Killua watched this with concern, but then Leorio began telling Liana off for taking nothing but bread, and spooning stew onto her plate amidst her whines, and they were all distracted.

 

It was a happy dinner, full of old stories punctuated by Liana’s demands for details, although when anyone attempted to explain to her, it all seemed to go over her head and she resumed teasing Gon. Just as well, Killua thought. Liana didn’t need to know about the darkness in their shared past.

 

It was clear that this child was happy, beloved by her parents. Kurapika in particular seemed to harbor a quiet but vast love for her, which awed Killua. Years ago, he wouldn’t have thought that Kurapika’s singleness of purpose could ever be diverted, certainly not by a child. But then, his profound love for Leorio was just as clear and just as unexpected. Killua had to wonder if it had always been there, and he’d simply failed to see it, because it was obviously the product of more than that disastrous expedition. They didn’t touch, hardly even exchanged glances as they tended to their guests and their child. Yet that love sang between them, written in tiny gestures as they passed plates or a wine bottle or wiped their daughter’s little fingers or left sentences unfinished, because they didn’t need to be.

 

When dinner was over and the dishes cleared, Kurapika said, “Bath time, Liana! Then bed.”

 

“Nooooo!” she wailed.

 

“Yes,” Kurapika said gently but firmly, “it’s grownup time.” He picked her up and carried her out of the room, kicking and protesting.

 

The others listened to her retreating wails until they faded. Killua laughed. “So, Leorio, I have to say I never pictured you as a dad.”

 

Leorio poured more wine for them all and said, “I didn’t either. But?” He shrugged his broad shoulders. “Life has a way of sneaking up on you.”

 

Killua looked closely at Leorio. Beneath the familiar bravado, he could see lines of tension. Worry. “Leorio…is Kurapika really okay?” he asked.

 

Leorio offered him a rather strained smile, and then said, “As far as I know?”

 

“You mean he doesn’t tell you?” Gon asked.

 

Leorio sighed. “Pika’s changed, but not that much. He doesn’t like to talk about himself. I have to trust that if something were really wrong, he’d tell me, at least for Liana’s sake.” He shrugged again. “But I worry about him. How couldn’t I, when I literally had to drag his sorry ass back to life?”

 

“Was it that bad?” Killua asked.

 

“It was worse,” Leorio said grimly, taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes. “After he…” He stopped, thought, and then began again. “After he did what he did on the way to the Dark Continent, I wasn’t sure that I could save him. That anybody could. While I was waiting for _anyone_ to find that damned rice, he stopped breathing more than once.”

 

Killua looked at Gon, appalled. By his expression, Gon hadn’t known this either. “But you saved him,” Gon said.

 

Leorio shrugged. “Did I? Or was it simply that when it came right down to it, he realized he didn’t actually want to die for a jarful of eyes?”

 

There was another long silence. Then Leorio shook himself, put his glasses back on and looked at Gon and Killua. “I know that you came here hoping that he could help you find Alluka. I understand exactly how important that is. But his nen isn’t what it was. In fact, given how he defied the restrictions, I’m surprised he can still use it at all. And when he does – well, let’s just say that generally he doesn’t. It takes too much of a toll. So I can’t say I’m happy about this.”

 

Killua tried not to be angry with Leorio for his words. He understood what it meant to love someone so fragile, the overwhelming need to protect them. But this wasn’t a frivolous request, and Leorio should know that. Killua didn’t realize that his anger had emerged as electricity, running circles around the fork he held in his hand, until Leorio laid his own big hand on top of it.

 

“I don’t control him, Killua,” Leorio said with clear difficulty. “He makes his own choices, and he chose to ask you here. To try to help you. But you need to know his limits. And you need to know that losing him would destroy our daughter. So please think about that.”

 

“Think about what?” Kurapika asked, coming back into the kitchen with a folded map.

 

“Being careful,” Leorio said, holding out an arm to Kurapika, who allowed himself to be caught by it, wrapped in it, settled into Leorio’s lap. The way that they looked at each other had Killua flushing as hotly as he would have if they’d started undressing each other then and there.

 

“I told you I’d be careful,” Kurapika said, touching Leorio’s lips with a frail finger, and then leaning forward to kiss him. But he drew back just as Leorio moved to pull him closer. “Stop that, or Killua will self-combust!” He unwound himself from a gloomy-looking Leorio as Gon laughed delightedly and Killua glowered into his wine glass. Kurapika settled on the bench beside Leorio and spread the map on the table.

 

“That’s only the known world,” Killua said.

 

“Yes,” Kurapika agreed, perusing it for a moment and then looking up at Killua with frank gray eyes. “Only a tiny part of the Dark Continent is mapped, and quite honestly, Killua, if that’s where Illumi’s taken Alluka, then you’ll never find them.”

 

The words hit Killua like a fist to the gut, but he made himself stay calm. Of course, Kurapika was right. “I understand,” he made himself say.

 

“And before we start this,” Kurapika continued, “you also have to know that there’s a very good chance that I’ll come up with nothing. But then, that would have been true even when I was operating at full power.”

 

This time, Killua could only nod.

 

“All right,” Kurapika said with the clipped resolve Killua remembered from so many years ago, and he focused on the map in front of him. Leorio, though, looked only at Kurapika, a half-broken heart in his eyes. Killua looked away from them, at the patchwork of continents on the map, and cleared everything from his mind but Alluka.

 

Kurapika drew a deep breath, and when he let it out the chains materialized on his right hand. Killua’s heart sank at the sight. They were all there, but they were faint, transparent. He wanted to cry, but he kept his face blank and his eyes fixed on the map. He had no doubt that Kurapika was suffering for this, and to show any disappointment or even doubt would be a betrayal. And so he was intensely grateful when he felt Gon’s hand creep into his, warm and comforting. He laced their fingers together, held on tightly.

 

Kurapika loosed the dowsing chain from his ring finger, the ball swaying slightly as it fell free. When it stilled, Kurapika’s concentration became something palpable. Killua could feel his aura, but it was shimmery and spectral as the chains looked. Gon squeezed his hand tighter, and Killua made himself breathe. Slowly, the dowsing ball began to move again. At first the movement was erratic, jags and circles twisting in every direction. As they watched, though, it settled into a trajectory, swinging a line between Estril and a point in the ocean to the southwest. It moved no further.

 

Kurapika caught the ball in his hand, looking up at Killua, who sat still as stone. “It isn’t what you think. He didn’t dump her in the ocean. Her aura is still strong, and it is somewhere in the direction the ball was swinging. But she’s too far away for me even to name a continent accurately. I’m sorry.”

 

And he was, Killua could see it. He was more than sorry – he was completely dejected. Killua was trying to muster words of comfort when Gon spoke up instead: “Maybe I can help.”  

 

“What?” Kurapika asked, defeat turning to a flicker of interest. “How?”

 

“Gon,” Killua said, “we’ve never tested it on anyone else.”

 

“Tested what?”

 

“You want to _test_ something on Kurapika?” Leorio demanded, furious. “Absolutely not!”

 

“Leorio,” Kurapika said, holding up a hand. “Let them explain.”

 

Gon and Killua looked at each other, and then Killua said, “It’s your story to tell, Gon.”

 

Gon nodded. “Okay. Well…you see…I sort of have my nen back…”

 

2

 

It took them over an hour to explain it all, including demonstrations (on both Killua and Leorio, the latter of which proved that Gon’s new hatsu worked on others besides Killua, and also resulted in several broken windows and one visit from a confused and sleepy child who had Heard Something.) Even after Kurapika had escorted Liana back to bed and Leorio cleaned up the broken glass, Gon and Killua found themselves fielding the same questions over and over again, further hindered by having to make frequent pauses for Leorio to rant at them, and pace, and tear his hair. In the end, though, Kurapika held up his hand again, in the midst of Leorio telling the younger men off colorfully in two languages.

 

“Enough,” he said, and Leorio shut his mouth, dropping back onto the bench with a look like a scolded puppy. “I want to try it.”

 

“Pika,” Leorio pleaded.

 

“One try, Leorio,” Kurapika said. “If it doesn’t work, or if it’s taking too much out of me, then we’ll stop.”

 

Leorio groaned, but he didn’t attempt to argue further.

 

“So? What should I do?” Kurapika asked Gon.

 

“Whatever you were doing before,” Gon answered.

 

Once again the chains shimmered into existence; once again the ball began to swing. This time it found its trajectory easily. When it was established, Gon pushed his aura slowly, carefully toward Kurapika. Killua watched as it flowed into their friend in a golden wave, but Kurapika showed no sign of feeling it other than a slight widening of his eyes.

 

“You okay, sweetheart?” Leorio asked, watching him carefully.

 

“Fine,” Kurapika said curtly, his eyes intent on the dowsing ball as its path across the map began to lengthen. He moved his hand with it as it swung farther and farther to the southwest, and then he glanced up at Gon, his eyes brighter than they’d been since Killua and Gon had arrived. “Can you give me more?” he asked.

 

“Yeah,” Gon said, allowing more of his aura to flow toward Kurapika.

 

The ball swung harder, and Killua allowed his half-crushed hope to breathe again. Kurapika followed the ball south and west with his palm until it stopped, the pendulum’s motion torquing until it was circular again, zeroing in over a specific piece of the map. And Killua’s heart stuttered, his reviving hope froze, because she couldn’t be there. Of all of the places in the world, Alluka simply couldn’t be in that one.

 

But of course she was. He almost laughed at the bitter ingenuity of it, the fact that he had ever actually believed that Illumi hadn’t been moving them like chess pieces over a board all along. Naturally, he had known that Killua would run to Gon. Therefore, it made perfect sense that he would take Alluka to the one place Killua could never ask Gon to go.

 

Voice low, eyes intent on Kurapika’s, Gon asked: “Are you sure?”

 

Kurapika sighed. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so certain of a divination. I can’t get more specific without a detailed map of the area, and I don’t have one. But Alluka is definitely in what was East Gorteau, somewhere in the vicinity of the former Royal Palace.” Kurapika retracted his chains. “I’m sorry.”

 

“No,” Killua said, fury closing his throat. “I am. None of you bear any responsibility for this, and I should never have brought any of you into it. I should have known.” He looked at Gon. “Gon, I am so sorry that I ever asked you to come with me. Consider all promises off.”

 

There was a long silence as Gon stared at Killua, eyebrows drawing together and eyes filling with hurt. Without a word, Leorio and Kurapika stood up and crept from the room.

 

“Why would you say that?” Gon asked Killua when they were alone. “Do you think I’m afraid to go? That I’ll fall apart and mess it all up? Do you think I’m _that_ weak?”

 

“No! I don’t think any of those things! But I can’t claim to love you and ask you to go back to that place.”

 

“And I can’t claim to love _you_ and let you go there alone,” Gon answered, a stubborn set to his jaw.        

 

“Gon,” Killua said. “It was bad enough for you facing those ants on the road. Imagine what it will be like to look at the ruins of that place. And what about the...other place? Shit, Gon, for all we know that’s where Illumi’s actually holding her. Do you really think that you’d be able to walk in there and not have it affect you?”

 

“I don’t know,” Gon said, his eyes intent on Killua’s. “Do you?”

 

“I didn’t almost die there, Gon! I didn’t lose my mind!”

 

“Didn’t you?” Gon asked with the simple honesty that was the heart of him. The purity of it almost broke Killua’s own heart.

 

“I – ” Killua began, and then he didn’t know how to continue, because he couldn’t say truthfully that Gon wasn’t right. The cruel words Gon had said to him all those years ago; the agony of watching him slowly destroy himself and knowing that he was powerless to stop it; the way that he’d wept and pleaded with Palm. Killua couldn’t deny that he had been very close to insanity, and if things had gone differently, he might well have been lost to it.

 

He dropped his head into his hands. “Gon,” he said, and it was a plea, though he had no words to follow it, because there weren’t words for what they were asking of each other, nor for what they were on the brink of pledging.

 

But Gon seemed to know this. He took Killua’s wrists gently but firmly, and pulled his hands away from his face. He cupped Killua’s face in his own hands, and kissed him softly, then touched his forehead to Killua’s. “I’m going with you, Killua. Not just to East Gorteau. Everywhere. Anywhere. Forever. I’ll _never_ watch you walk away from me again.”

 

Killua drew a deep breath. “And what about you? Do you promise never to leave _me_ again?”

 

“Haven’t I already promised you that?”

 

Killua nodded his head against Gon’s. “But that was before we knew exactly what it would mean.”

 

“I won’t leave you, Killua. Never again. Pinky swear?”

 

Killua had to laugh, even if it was rueful. He opened his eyes, and found Gon’s intent on his. “After you tricked me about the slugs? No way. Besides, I have a much better idea if we’re making forever kinds of promises.”

 

“Do you mean – ” Gon began, his eyes widening.

 

Killua shut him up with a kiss, and then grabbed his hand, and pulled him toward the stairs. Because if there was ever going to be a moment, this was it.

 

3

 

Someone had re-made the bed and left a small light burning on one of the bedside tables. Killua felt a pang of guilt at the kindness, given the imminent destruction of another set of pristine white bedding. Then Gon was backing him against the wall, parting his legs with one hard thigh as he bit and lapped at his throat, and Killua stopped caring. They were both painfully hard; this wasn’t the first or even the second time that they’d paused to kiss and grind on the way up from the kitchen, and Killua knew that he wouldn’t last long like this. But he was damned if he was going to come before he was ready, and so he shoved Gon away.

 

“Killua!” Gon whined.

 

“Don’t worry,” he said, taking him by the shoulders and walking him toward the bed, “you’ll get what you want. But not if you keep that up. And besides, you can’t just do it, you know. For that matter,” he frowned, “we don’t have any lube.” He sighed, looking at Gon’s lush, parted lips, his darkened eyes, the quick pulse at his throat. “Let me see what’s in the bathroom.”

 

“You don’t need to,” Gon said.

 

“Gon, I really don’t think you want to do this without – ”

 

Before he could finish, Gon had crawled across the bed, opened the drawer of the bedside table and brought out a tube of gel and a handful of condoms. He dumped then triumphantly in front of Killua.

 

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Killua asked incredulously. “Leorio and Kurapika stock their guest rooms with sex implements? Don’t tell me, there are toys in the other drawer.”

 

Gon grinned. “I don’t know. Wanna see?”

 

“Gon! Did you tell them to put this stuff here?”

 

“No,” Gon said. “But they knew we’re together, and Leorio’s a doctor, so I guess he wanted us to be safe?”

 

Killua shoved the pile aside and flopped down on the bed next to Gon. “Thinking about Leorio thinking about us doing this kinda kills the mood.”

 

“Then don’t think about it,” Gon said, turning to him with laughing eyes and a wicked smile. “Think about this.” And with a single, hard tug, he’d pulled off Killua’s shorts and underwear, the button clattering to the floor and rolling away. Then his mouth was on Killua’s length, and Killua’s cry of protest melted into a moan of pleasure. Gon had gotten very good at this, very fast – which really wasn’t surprising to Killua. Gon had always been a fast learner but _shit,_ where had he learned to twist his hand like that, use his tongue like that? Killua was already on the brink of orgasm again. He dug his fingers into Gon’s hair, and pulled him away from his cock.

 

“Why did you do that?” Gon asked petulantly. “Was I doing something wrong?”

 

“No, you idiot! You were doing everything _right,_ and if you want me to keep that promise I made downstairs, you have to stop it _now!”_ He pulled his shirt over his head and tossed it on the floor, and then pulled off Gon’s, pausing to tease each nipple to peaks with his tongue before he pulled off his shorts. Gon was so hard he was leaking, the head of his cock reddish-purple, so Killua only ran his tongue over it a few times, lightly, before he pulled away.

 

In response to Gon’s protests he said, “The more you want this, the better it will be.” He pulled Gon around so that he was splayed out in front of him, pushing his legs apart with his knees. He grabbed the tube of lube, squeezed a generous bit onto his fingers, and then looked down at Gon, who was looking up at him with half-lidded eyes. “Are you sure about this?” he asked, closing his palm around his slippery fingers to warm them.

 

“I’ve never been more sure about anything,” Gon said, his voice low and husky.

 

Killua leaned forward to kiss him as he reached between his legs, stroking his balls and his perineum and then, finally, his entrance. He toyed with the outside until Gon was shuddering, and then he slipped one finger inside. For a moment Gon clenched around him, letting out a gasp. Killua stopped, looking down at him, afraid that he’d hurt him. But Gon’s eyes were wide with surprise, not pain, and after a moment he let out a stuttering breath and said, “More.”

 

“Patience,” Killua whispered before he kissed him again, and began to thrust his finger in and out. He’d explored his own body enough to know where Gon’s sweet spot would be, but he didn’t expect the simple brush of a finger along it to make Gon arch his back like he did. Killua had just enough presence of mind to slam his free hand against Gon’s mouth and stifle the accompanying cry; if Liana heard _that_ and woke up _,_ he was fairly

certain he’d die on the spot.

 

Gon bit his hand, and when Killua snatched it away he rasped, “More!” Tears glistened in the corners of his eyes. “Please, Killua, _more!”_

“Okay,” Killua said, “but whatever you do, do _not_ yell!”

 

“Pinky swear,” Gon said, “or, you know, any finger you want.”

 

Laughing softly, Killua slid in a second finger. Gon bit down hard on his lip and thrust up again toward Killua, but he let out no more than a strangled moan this time. Slowly, Killua started thrusting again, Gon’s elastic muscles pulling at him, pleading with him for more along with his soft whimpers. He spread his fingers to see if Gon could take it, and Gon just said, “Harder.” Killua curled them, brushing Gon’s prostate again and the tears hovering in his eyes spilled down his cheeks. But he was laughing too, joyously, soundlessly, his face like a sunrise.

 

“How are you so beautiful?” Killua murmured.

 

“Everything I am is for you. Do it, Killua,” he implored, arching his back so that their cocks slid against each other. “I need you inside of me. As much of you as I can have.”

 

Killua groaned, and pulled his fingers out of Gon, reaching for the lube and a condom. But when Gon heard the crackle of the packet, he caught Killua’s hand and said, “No. We don’t need it.”

 

“Not for protection. But do you have any idea of the mess we’ll be cleaning up if I don’t use this?”

 

“I don’t care. I don’t want there to be anything between us.”

 

“Gon…”

 

“Killua,” Gon said, his voice a purr, his eyes like melted chocolate in the half-light, soft and sweet and so full of longing.

 

“Damn it Gon. Will I ever be able to say no to you?”

 

Gon only smiled, took the tube from Killua, squeezed lube onto his hand and then ran it along Killua’s length, his hand just tight enough to make Killua throw his head back and keen. And then his hand was gone again.

 

“You are a fucking nightmare,” Killua said, and then he hitched Gon’s legs over his arms, positioned himself and pushed inside of him. But then he didn’t need to push. Gon pulled him in, all the way to the hilt, and Killua wanted to weep at how good it felt. Nothing in his life had ever come close to this.

 

“Are you going to move, Killua?” Gon asked after a moment.

 

“Oh, yes,” Killua answered, and carefully, he began to thrust, pulling out of Gon just a little bit and then plunging back in.

 

“You can do it harder,” Gon said, a look on his face Killua had never seen before: intent, indulgent, and insanely sexy. “You won’t break me.”

 

Killua let a breath out, and then started pulling out farther, driving in more forcefully. Gon let out something between a laugh and a sob, and then took his cock in his hand, started clumsily stroking it. Killua pushed Gon’s hand aside and took over, stroking in time with his thrusts.

 

“Killua,” Gon moaned. “Killua! Fuck me _harder!”_

 

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Killua said, brushing Gon’s lips with his own.

 

“Aren’t…hurting…me…” Gon said in the moments when he had control of his voice. “Killua, it feels _so good!”_

 

At that, Killua’s restraint crumbled. He plunged himself into Gon as Gon cried out softly and murmured and clutched at him, and he stroked Gon relentlessly. “You okay?” he asked.

 

“Better than okay,” Gon panted.

 

“I’m almost there,” Killua said.

 

“So am I. Just…let yourself do it Killua. Come in me.”

 

“Gon,” he breathed, not knowing whether it was loud enough for him to hear it. “I love you so much…I love you more than anything…” And then he tipped over the edge, spilling hot streams of seed into Gon as Gon writhed under him, and came in Killua’s hand a moment later.

 

Killua knew that they were both making noise, but he couldn’t care anymore, because coming inside Gon was the most beautiful thing he could ever have imagined. Except that he couldn’t have imagined it – the dazzling bliss, the utter abandon of his body, the deep need for Gon that he knew no amount of sex would ever quench. They held each other through their orgasms, pulling away when pleasure finally turned to over-sensitivity. Then they lay together on the wet bedspread, sweaty and breathless and entirely drunk on each other.

 

“Thank you,” Gon said at last, pushing Killua’s damp hair out of his eyes and kissing his forehead, his cheeks, his mouth.

 

“You’re thanking _me?”_ Killua asked, incredulous. “Do you have any idea what that was like? Gon – ” Killua caught his hands, kissed them. “I would do anything for you.”

 

Gon chuckled. “Because I let you fuck me?”

 

Killua felt himself blushing, but he didn’t flinch from Gon’s eyes. “Well, yes. But only because of all the things that _made_ you let me. You are…you are my dearest and my best. Just…” Killua stopped, thought of a dusty motel room years in the past, a bluebird singing on the roof as despair turned into hope. “Let me walk beside you. Let me be with you, always.”

 

Gon pulled him down and kissed him deeply, speaking into Killua’s mouth all of the things Killua knew that he didn’t have words for. When he finally let him go, though, Gon traced Killua’s lips with his fingers and said, “Always.”

*

 

Dawn found them in the bathtub, the water too cool after the long time they’d spent there, the pine-scented bubbles mostly gone, but neither of them ready to leave. “Can we stay here forever?” Gon asked, pulling Killua closer. Killua felt Gon hardening against him again as he slid his hands up Killua’s slender body, and although almost every part of his own body ached after all that they’d done, he would happily do more if Gon wanted it.

 

“You know we can’t,” Killua said sadly, turning to brush Gon’s wet, black hair from his forehead, kissing his temple, his hand traveling down to brush Gon’s half-hard cock.

 

“Then can I have you one more time?” Gon asked, looking down into Killua’s eyes. His own were black in the blue dawn light. “Before everything changes?”

 

Killua straddled him in the lukewarm water, kissing along his jaw. “You can have anything I have the power to give you,” he said at last.

 

“Anything?” Gon asked, catching him in his arms and kissing him lazily, leaning down to bite a nipple gently.

 

“Anything,” Killua said, because tired as he was, he also knew now what lay ahead. He wanted to have as much of Gon as he could while they were still safe and warm, because he didn’t know when that would happen again. He couldn’t bring himself to think _if._

 

“So,” he said, “what did you have in mind?”

 

Gon looked at him for a moment, and there was just enough light for Killua to see the glint of mischief in his eyes. Then Gon flicked the drain on the bath, leapt out and grabbed Killua’s hands. “I think,” he said as Killua dripped and spluttered, “it’s time to see what’s in the other drawer.”

 


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Alluka and Joji face some hard truths, and Illumi tips his hand. Just a little.

**Former Republic of East Gorteau**

1

Alluka was despondent. Although Miyako continued to deliver little notes of encouragement to her, it had been a week since Joji had spoken to her and he hadn’t been back. Illumi had been delivering her meals. That meant that there was nothing to distract her from the photograph that Illumi had given her the last time he’d come to demand and threaten: Killua in a sleeping roll with another young man who could only be Gon, the two of them twined together in a way that made it clear they were lovers. They both looked so peaceful in slumber; so blissfully happy. Illumi had written three words on the back of the print in his stark hand: One Week Away.

 

She turned the picture this way and that in the fading light, agonizing over it, blind to the beautiful evening sky through the tiny window. It was pink with billows of blue cloud after a heavy rain shower. Swallows flitted against it, chasing the flies the moisture had brought out. Alluka had noticed that Illumi was late with her supper, and was beginning to wonder if he had decided to start cutting out meals entirely, when she heard a familiar step on the stair and the metal door grated open.

 

She set the picture aside as Miyako swooped into the room, followed by Joji carrying a laden tray and a candle lantern. The bird landed in front of Alluka and reached to jab her feet, which she quickly withdrew. She had learned, though, that this was a sign that Miyako wanted her to let Nanika loose. The two of them had developed a fascination with each other, and spent a good deal of time chasing each other around the small, square room when Miyako came to deliver her notes, apparently conversing in some language of their own. Nanika wasn’t able to translate these conversations, which by turns made Alluka uneasy, or else glad, since it meant Illumi probably wouldn’t be able to learn anything from Miyako if he ever tried raiding her mind.

 

Before Alluka let her out, though, she raised a questioning eyebrow at Joji. “Illumi’s away for a while,” Joji said. “It’s safe.”

 

“You’re sure?” Alluka asked.

 

“Yes. Miyako watched him until he was well beyond the village.”

 

“Where is he going?”

 

“I don’t know. He doesn’t tell me that kind of thing. But I heard him on the phone earlier, arranging to meet someone.”

 

“He could be pretending. To try to catch us out.”

 

Joji sighed, setting the tray beside her. “Anything is possible, Alluka. But I can’t help you if I don’t take the odd risk. Here. Eat something. I know exactly how little he’s been feeding you.”

 

It was true, she was starving, and what Joji had brought her smelled delicious. She took a more careful look at the tray. There was a thick, yellow curry soup, an accompanying bowl of noodles and many kinds of garnishes, a plate of fried spring rolls and dipping sauces, and a bowl of what looked like rice pudding.

 

“Are you trying to make up for it all at once?” Alluka asked. “It looks amazing, but I can’t possibly eat all of this.”

 

“Actually,” Joji said, glancing at her shyly, “I was hoping that we could share it. It took a while to make it, and I haven’t eaten yet.”

 

Alluka looked up at him in surprise, and felt herself blushing. “You – want to eat dinner with me?”

 

“Unless you’d rather not,” Joji said, blushing in kind.

 

“No! I mean yes, I would! I just – what if we don’t hear Illumi coming back?”

 

Joji smiled, and then whistled softly. Miyako fluttered down from her position by Nanika on the cobwebbed chandelier and alighted on his shoulder. He spoke to her in a language that Alluka didn’t understand, and then Miyako flew off through the window bars. To Alluka’s surprise, Nanika followed.

 

_Where are you going?_ Alluka cried.

 

_To watch with her for Illumi._

_Nanika!_

_I can’t go far. Don’t worry._

And with that, she was gone, Alluka staring at the empty window with a cold feeling of abandonment.

 

“Is everything okay?” Joji asked.

 

“I – I don’t know? She’s never left me like that before.”

 

Joji studied her, and then said, “I know that it’s not really my business, but isn’t that something you’ve been practicing? You and Nanika separating, and her trying to increase the distance between you?” Alluka looked back at him, startled. “Sorry,” he said with an embarrassed laugh. “Miyako told me.”

 

“She tells you what I do?” Alluka asked. It wasn’t as if she did anything of note, but the thought of the bird watching her and telling Joji about it was still uncomfortable.

 

He blushed more deeply. “It’s not like that! I mean, I don’t ask her for reports. But she’s fascinated with Nanika. So she tells me what Nanika does, and…” He shrugged. “Sometimes that means I hear about you, too. Look, won’t you eat something?”

 

Alluka sighed. “Okay. If you do.”

 

Joji smiled, and offered the plate of spring rolls. Alluka took one, and chose a dark-looking dipping sauce for it. She was still distracted and anxious at Nanika’s leaving, but as soon as she bit into it, she forgot about her wayward twin. She finished the roll in two bites, and then said, “Joji, this is amazing! You made all of this yourself?”

 

Joji nodded, still looking embarrassed as he chewed his own spring roll.

 

“How did you learn to cook like this?”

 

His smile turned rueful. “My father taught me. He was a chef at the Royal Palace before the war. He was teaching me when…when everything happened.” He paused, drew a deep breath. “And then he died, and there’s no more Royal Palace, no one left to cook elaborate meals for…” He looked away from Alluka in a gesture that she recognized far too well. Killua did the same thing whenever she brought up Gon. He didn’t want her to see the pain in his eyes.

 

“I’m sorry,” she said softly.

 

Joji sighed. “So am I. But it was a long time ago, now. Five years.” His eyes traveled back to her face. “Do you know about it? The war? The ants? Did it even make the news in your country?”

 

Alluka took another spring roll, dipped it into a red-colored sauce and chewed it slowly, mainly to buy time to decide how to answer that question. “I – think it did. But I was only eleven then, and my family didn’t really let me know things.”

 

“Didn’t let you know things?” Joji asked, puzzled. He forked some noodles into a bowl, ladled soup on top and then handed it to her along with a spoon and chopsticks. “They thought you were too young?”

 

“No,” Alluka said, poking at the soup with the spoon. “They…they didn’t trust me. Because of Nanika, and the things we used to do.” She sighed. “I’ve told you we’re dangerous.”

 

“And not telling you world events made that better?”

 

Alluka laughed ruefully. “No. Well, maybe. I don’t really know. The point is, they used to keep us in a place where we couldn’t hurt anyone.”

 

“What kind of place?” Joji asked, his eyebrows pulled together.

 

“It…was under our house. Underground. There were a lot of doors in between me and the rest of the house.”

 

“Alluka,” he said, his look twisting, “your family locked you in a _basement?”_

 

“Yes,” she said softly, miserably. “It had everything I needed. More things than most kids ever have, or could want, really. I mean, it wasn’t a dark hole in the ground. But they did lock me in. They had to. I understand that now. They were afraid of what we might do, Nanika and me.”

 

“But what _would_ you do? And why? Shouldn’t they have been afraid of your brother?”

 

“No. They know how to control him,” she said bitterly. “They could control all of my brothers – but not me.”

 

“So they locked you up by yourself? That’s just cruel! You were only a child!”

 

“Yes. But I was a child with infinite power, and no control over it.”

 

“Power to do what?” he asked, shaking his head, incredulous, and Alluka knew that he was looking at her slender body, her soft face and eyes and long, fine limbs, and wondering what threat a child version of her could possibly have posed.

 

Here it was, and after all of his kindness, she couldn’t lie to him again. “Joji, if you could heal your mother, would you run then? And would you take me with you?”

 

He gave her a speculative look. “I wish that I could say yes. But I’ve already told you about her, and my father. She would never leave this place, because it would mean leaving him.”

 

“Are you absolutely certain of that?”

 

“Yes,” he sighed. “Before she was so sick, I tried to get her to leave, to get treatment in one of the big cities. She wouldn’t. I think…” He paused, clearly sifting through difficult words. “I think she doesn’t really want to get better. She just wants to be with him. But why are you asking this?”

 

Alluka took a deep breath and then said, “Because I can grant wishes. Well, Nanika can. But we hardly ever do it, because the price is almost always suffering. Other people’s suffering. The bigger the wish, the worse it is. The only free wishes are the ones for healing.” There was really no point in telling him about Killua’s override – not until it could actually help them.

 

Joji watched her for another moment, and then he sighed, and began to spoon up his own soup. “She won’t do it,” he said after they’d both eaten in silence for several long moments. “I’m so sorry, Alluka. Is there any wish I could make that would help you?”

 

Alluka smiled sadly. “Nothing that’s worth the cost.”

 

“Thank you for trusting me with this. And you have my word that I’ll never ask you for anything.”

 

Alluka’s eyes flew up to his in disbelief. She’d never met a person who didn’t want something from her, once they knew what she could do. Even Killua had sought something more in seeking her out all those years ago. She wanted to offer Joji something in return for his selflessness, but she didn’t know what.

 

Instead she said, “I do know about the war. About the ants. My brother Killua, who I lived with before this, got me out of our house right after it happened. His best friend was injured in the war and…well, he needed me to save him.”

 

Joji didn’t look at her, only continued eating, but she could feel the questions he was stomping down.

 

“Killua can make wishes and nothing bad happens. That’s why Illumi’s keeping me here. He wants me to tell him how to do the same thing – to use me to take control of our family, and the money, and gods know what else.”

 

She paused, wondering whether to tell him all of it; but in the end, what did it matter? Even if Joji turned on her and told Illumi the truth, he wouldn’t believe it. “But,” she said resignedly, “I can’t tell him that, because I don’t know. Killua doesn’t know. We don’t even know that the free passes would always work for Killua, and so he almost never makes wishes.” Alluka set down her bowl, met his eyes. “Joji – please believe that I would do it for you if I could. I would let you wish to help your mother, if it wouldn’t turn into something terrible.”

 

He sighed. “I know. I mean, if you weren’t truly afraid of the repercussions you would probably have found a way to make me wish for Illumi to drop dead. Or at least let you go and forget you existed.”

 

“If only,” Alluka muttered.

 

Joji gave her a sweet, sad smile. “Since we can’t do that, let’s talk about how we’re _actually_ going to help you.”

 

“I thought you couldn’t get me out of here?”

 

“I said that I can’t just let you go,” Joji answered, “not that I’m going to leave you here to rot!”

 

“You have a plan?”

 

He gave her an equivocal look. “That depends on what you can tell me about your brother Killua and his friend Gon, who appear to be coming to find you.”

 

“You know about that?” Alluka asked, surprised that Illumi would have given up this information.

 

“Miyako told me what Illumi said to you about them. I mean, using them to get to you. But I’ve also heard him talking to people about them on the phone. I know that they’re together, and they’re looking for you. So. What should we expect when they show up?”

 

Alluka picked up the photo and handed it to him. “Disaster,” she said. “The man with white hair is Killua. The one with black hair – he was my brother’s first friend. His first love too, I think, and clearly his current one. But he’s lost his nen, and Illumi’s going to use that against them, and us.”

 

Joji looked at the picture for a long time, and then he gave it back to her. “Are you certain that he can?”

 

“Look at them, Joji! They’re hopeless for each other, and Illumi uses love like a chess piece.”

 

Contemplatively, Joji re-filled his empty bowl, and then Alluka’s. “I don’t think love is always a weakness, Alluka.”

 

She sighed. “He’s using it against you, isn’t he? And me, by association.”

 

“He’s trying. But love also gives you strength. That picture of your brother and his lover...it reminds me of my parents. They loved each other like that.” He smiled a small, faraway smile. “It’s how they survived the invasion, the food shortages, the raids. It’s how they managed to make me feel safe during all of it. And even if it couldn’t save my father in the end, it’s why my mother won’t leave him now. So I don’t think your brother would be bringing his friend into this if he didn’t need him here - or if he wasn’t strong enough to handle it.”

 

Alluka considered this. Joji was talking about emotional support, but what if it was more than that? Could Illumi be hiding something about Gon, in order to fire her doubt? It was certainly possible. On the other hand, she’d witnessed the result of Nanika healing Gon, and his nen had been dormant when he came out the other side.

 

“It isn’t that simple,” she said at last.

 

“Why not?”

 

Alluka put the spoon aside and swirled noodles around in the soup with her chopsticks. “Because this is the place where Gon lost his mind – and Killua almost lost Gon.”

 

Joji raised his eyebrows. “Start at the beginning?”

 

And so Alluka told him everything she knew about Gon’s breakdown and the near-fatal fight with Pitou, though she had to wonder how much of it was truly accurate. All she knew was what Killua had been willing to tell her. She also told him about Illumi’s threats to her.

 

“So,” she said in conclusion, scooping up the last of the rice pudding, “the worst case scenario is that they’ll both be emotional wrecks when they get here. Illumi chose this place for exactly that reason, and he’ll be ready to take advantage of it.”

 

Joji thought for a time, and then he said, “I have to assume that they won’t be mad enough to just walk up to the front door and knock.”

 

Alluka laughed. “Gon probably would, from what Killua’s said about him. But Killua would never let him.”

 

“So then, I’m going to have Miyako keep watch. When she sees them coming, I’ll send her with a message to warn them.”

 

“Killua probably won’t trust it.”

 

“Even if you write it?”

 

“He’ll think Illumi forced me to.”

 

“So, what _would_ he trust?”

 

Alluka considered this, and an idea began to form, based on what Nanika had said so long ago – but now it all began to make a kind of sense. “Killua told me Gon had empathy with animals as a child. He tamed a foxbear, and he could talk to seagulls, that kind of thing. Does that ever go away? I mean, it wasn’t tied to his nen. But still, he went through significant trauma.”

 

Joji looked at her helplessly. “I truly don’t know. But I doubt it. It isn’t like learning to use nen. It’s innate. Almost an instinct.”

 

“Okay. Then we’ll send Miyako with a written message to them when they’re close. But can you also ask her to try to speak to Gon? To explain the situation?”

 

“Yes. That, I can do.”

 

Alluka met his eyes. “Thank you, Joji. For everything.”

 

He shook his head. “I only wish it could be more. And now, I’d better go and wash the dishes before Illumi sees them and gets suspicious.”

 

He reached for the tray, but before he could lift it, Alluka caught his hand and squeezed it. He rewarded her with one of his rare, brilliant smiles, and her stomach tightened with a feeling that was a bit like hunger, and also completely unlike it. She gazed after him long after he’d gone.

 

2

 

The next morning, Illumi brought Alluka her meager breakfast with a look on his usually impassive face that was all too close to smug for her liking. “Now,” he said, dropping the tray beside her, “would be the time for you to start talking.”

 

Alluka snorted. “Why? You’ll take away my cardboard porridge if I don’t?”

 

“Careful with that mouth, little brother. I might decide to wire it shut.”

 

“That would be a major obstacle in your plan to force us to grant wishes.”

 

She could tell that she’d touched a nerve when Illumi’s lips thinned further. It was a small detail, but it was one she recognized as a mark of annoyance. “Oh, you’ll be compliant.” He reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone and tapped something on the screen. Then he handed it to her.

 

Alluka looked at the video for a few long moments, its meaning dawning on her slowly. It showed two figures boarding a cargo airship via its loading bay. Their stealthy movements made it clear that they were sneaking onto the ship, and worried about detection. She couldn’t make out their faces, but the shock of silver hair on the taller figure was as familiar to her as her own face. She had no doubt that the shorter, stockier figure was Gon.

 

She’d had a brief fantasy of trying to call Killua, warn him, but no doubt Illumi would have locked the keypad. “So?” she asked, handing him the phone back. “You already knew they were coming here.”

 

Illumi smiled. “But now I know exactly when, and where. Three days, Alluka. I have an ambush set up. If you don’t want me to destroy Killua, you’ll start talking.”

 

“You’re still assuming that Gon’s helpless.”

 

“No, I have proof that he’s helpless,” Illumi said, cocking his head at her, a grotesque parody of Miyako. “I’ve had them attacked twice on their little adventure. Gon has never used _jajanken._ Clearly, he can’t. And our idiot of a brother is still smitten enough with him to think bringing him to this fight is a good idea.”

 

Alluka didn’t respond immediately. There was something off in Illumi’s tone. It was slight, but she was certain that there was something Illumi knew about Gon that he wasn’t telling her. And then there were his words: never used _jajanken._ But using nen didn’t simply mean using a hatsu. _Could_ Gon have revived his nen? Did he have an ability he was hiding, or still honing? Was Illumi actually worried?

 

Unlikely, she decided. If he were truly worried he would be moving her now, not taunting her in this prison tower. Still, though, a crack of doubt wasn’t something to discount. Alluka was almost tempted to reach out with her hatsu, to test whether there really was a fracture in Illumi’s armor that she could exploit. But no. He would detect it, and she needed to keep her secrets until the moment she had to use them.

 

“They aren’t stupid, Illumi,” she said at last. “And I’m not either. I’m not telling you anything.”

 

He studied her with his opaque eyes. “Your mistake, little brother. You may not be stupid, but all of you are slaves to emotion. I am not. And I _will_ get what I want.”

 


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Leorio and Kurapika make an announcement. And Gon and Killua head for former East Gorteau, and consider some hard choices ahead of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The only smut in this chapter is hinted at - it's there, but not explicit. If you haven't seen it yet and you're interested in the (very nsfw) circumstances behind Leorio and Kurapika's announcement, you can read all about it in my side fic "On the Tip of Your Tongue." I've also decided to post two chapters tonight, because really, they probably should have been combined into one. But since they aren't, this is easier.

**The Airship “Beyond”**

1

Killua looked out of the dingy window of the cargo hold, where he and Gon had set up a makeshift camp among packing crates. The tarnished lights of a large city scattered in a rough circle far below. The capitol of Viteliu, he thought. Beyond it stretched the blank, black ocean. Gon was asleep with his head in Killua’s lap, a blanket pulled over him. Killua stroked his hair absently, half his mind on where they were headed, the other half back in Leorio and Kurapika’s sunlit garden, hoping to hell that that wasn’t the last moment of unsullied happiness he and Gon would know.

 

Liana had insisted on having a picnic lunch there when Gon and Killua had finally dragged themselves out of bed. She and Kurapika had gone to the market for food while Killua, Gon and Leorio looked into transport to the former East Gorteau. Once they’d found a suitable cargo ship and formulated a plan to sneak Gon and Killua onboard, Liana had dragged them outside to the palm-shaded garden, where she and Kurapika had set out lunch.

 

There had been woven blankets stretched under date palms, lavish plates of meat and cheese and fruit and bread, more than any of them could eat. After a time, Kurapika had laid his head in Leorio’s lap and shut his eyes as Leorio played with his hair, their child laughing and squealing as she played on her climbing frame behind them. Gon had leaned over and kissed Killua, his lips still sweet with mango juice.

 

“Gon,” Killua had said with a little reproach, but he couldn’t muster much, nor could he keep himself from circling Gon’s waist with his arms.

 

“Don’t scold him,” Kurapika had said, his eyes still closed. “Graciously accept everything you offer each other. Live every moment of it.”

 

“Pika,” Leorio had said, his voice so full of emotion Killua had wanted to run from it.

 

But his two friends had laced hands, and Kurapika had sat up, a small smile on his face. “Should we tell them?” he’d asked Leorio.

 

Leorio had grinned back at him. “I thought you’d yell at me if I did!”

 

Kurapika had narrowed his eyes. “When do I ever yell at you?”

 

“Tell us what?” Gon had demanded, eyes bright with interest, thankfully derailing the squabble.

 

“Well, it’s more of an ask,” Kurapika had said.

 

“A favor,” Leorio’d added.

 

“I’m intrigued,” Killua had said.

 

“We want you to be our best men in our wedding.”

 

“You’re getting married?” Gon had demanded, his smile luminous, hurling himself at them in a hug.

 

“When?” Killua had asked, stunned.

 

Leorio had laughed, pushing Gon off. “Well…we haven’t quite got that far with the planning, yet.”

 

“So this is a recent thing?”

 

Leorio and Kurapika had exchanged a conspiratorial look. “Quite recent,” Kurapika had said.

 

“Who gets who?” Gon had asked.

 

“Your choice,” Kurapika had said, toppling as Liana careened into his lap.

 

Gon had tilted his head. “Let’s go with color coding. You and me, man,” he’d winked at Leorio.

 

Leorio had shrugged. “Works for me,” he’d said nonchalantly, but Killua had heard the worry in his undertone.

 

“We’ll be here for you,” Killua had said, “that’s a promise.” And he’d meant it.

 

But now, stowaways on an airship bound for the Republic of West Gorteau, he couldn’t help wondering whether it was a promise he should have made. He had no illusions about just how dangerous their undertaking was. Given that Illumi seemed to have guessed their every step so far, he must be planning for them to walk into his den, and he didn’t seem remotely concerned about it. _Why not? Had he already found a way to control Nanika? Or worse?_ Killua sighed again, buried his fingers in Gon’s thick hair – one of the few things, now, that could soothe him.

 

“Lie down with me, Killua,” Gon mumbled sleepily, reaching a hand up under Killua’s shirt to stroke his back. A shiver ran up Killua’s spine, and he had to smile at the fact that even now, on the way to face the firing squad, one touch from Gon could unravel him.

 

“If I lie down with you, will you let me sleep?” Killua asked, combing through Gon’s hair again with his fingers.

 

“Mmm, maybe,” Gon said. “If you keep doing that.”

 

Killua laughed softly. “I can’t do this if I’m sleeping, Gon.”

 

“Lie down anyway,” Gon answered, tugging on Killua until he wriggled under the blanket, into Gon’s arms. “I feel you worrying,” he said, pressing his lips to the back of Killua’s neck, sliding his hands around him and upward under his shirt, softly stroking his chest. _Gods, how had he ever lived without this?_

 

“Of course I’m worrying,” Killua said, although he pressed himself back into Gon and couldn’t help a small whimper when Gon circled his nipples with his fingers.

 

“I guess I can’t make you stop,” Gon said after a moment spent pressing more kisses into Killua’s neck. “But maybe I can distract you? For a little while?”

 

Killua turned over, kissed Gon softly on the side of his mouth. “You could. You know that. But Gon…shouldn’t we be thinking about what we’re walking into?”

 

Gon finally opened his eyes. They were very dark in the dim utility lighting. “We could think about it,” Gon said at last, “but what would that help, in the end? All we know for sure is that Alluka’s in what used to be East Gorteau. We know the way there from West Gorteau. We really can’t plan anything more until we understand the situation, we can’t understand the situation until we’re close to them, and we can’t get close to them until we’re on the ground. So?” He leaned forward, kissed Killua again. “Let me make you happy. Or at least as happy as you can be, right now.”

 

A part of Killua thought that he should argue with this; that he shouldn’t give in to pleasure, so close to their goal. The rest of him realized that they were stuck on this airship for the next few days, with nothing to do but brood, unless he let Gon have his way. And so he let him.

 

2

 

When they woke the next morning, they took turns washing in the tiny bathroom near the stairway to the upper decks, one keeping watch for the other. Then they retreated to their space amidst the packing crates, leaning together to look out the window as they ate some of the food Leorio and Kurapika had packed for them.

 

“Do you know what that is?” Gon asked, pointing down at a crescent-shaped city curled into a curve of land with nothing but sea beyond. He never got used to airship journeys, watching the land spread out like a slow-playing film of a map below.

 

“Kakin Port, I think,” Killua said, pausing to chew and swallow a bit of meat and bread as he studied it. “Yeah. We’ll cross the peninsula, and then it will be nothing but ocean for a while. We’ll probably pass over Greed Island.”

 

Gon laughed softly. “That seems like a hundred years ago.”

 

“It was practically a hundred years ago.”

 

“Mmm,” Gon mused, thinking back on those long, grueling days with Bisky, when he and Killua had finally begun to understand what true strength felt like. “A long time. But still…that was when I knew.”

 

Killua turned to him. “Knew what?” Killua’s eyes were blue as the sky above the sea; as blue as they’d been on that long-ago day on Greed Island, on a street lined with bright storefronts, when Gon had tried to tell his best friend what he meant to him. They’d been laughable words, so inadequate for what he’d felt. But they’d been all he had, and he had no doubt that what he felt for Killua now traced straight back to that day. Probably further back than that.

 

Gon shifted to lean against the window so that he could face him. “That I loved you.”

 

Killua blinked, his eyes widening. “You – knew that then?”

 

Gon shrugged. “I mean, it wasn’t how I love you now.”

 

“Gods, I hope not!” Killua said.

 

“It’s just…you were always special, Killua. But that was when I realized exactly _how_ special. Do you remember what I said to you, on that street?”

 

Killua smiled. “That you were glad you got to know me. And then I told you you were embarrassing, and walked away.”

 

Gon sighed. “Yeah.”

 

Killua took one of Gon’s hands, played with his fingers. “But do you know what I _didn’t_ say to you?”

 

“How would I know what you didn’t say?”

 

Killua stopped playing with his fingers and just held his hand, and all at once Gon couldn’t look away from him. His eyes were wide, and soft, and serious. “I didn’t say that _I_ was the lucky one, for getting to know _you._ That I should have been the one thanking you. But I thought it. I still do. And I know that it’s selfish, but I’m so very glad that you’re here with me now.”

 

“Killua,” Gon said, reaching forward and pulling him into his arms, and then he didn’t know what to say, because Killua – perfect, poised, sharp and brilliant as starlight – was trembling against him, his face pressed into his neck. “Killua,” he said again, gently, stroking his back as he began to shake in earnest, “it’s going to be okay.”

 

“Is it?” Killua asked, speaking against his skin. “It’s been so long now. Over a month. What if we get to her and she’s not her anymore? What if he’s broken her?”

 

“Killua,” Gon sighed, wondering why it was so much easier to comfort Killua with touches than with words; also knowing that it was words Killua needed right now. “I know that we can’t really know anything. Not yet. But Alluka…she’s your sister. She’s a Zoldyck, and I don’t think any of you break easily. Besides, I know that you’ll have taught her well.”

 

Killua shook his head against Gon’s chest. “I taught her as well as I could. But it was just the two of us, and this is Illumi we’re talking about.”

 

“Look, I know that it’s hard, but you have to try to have faith in your sister right now. She’ll know that you’re coming for her, and she’ll use that to hold on against whatever he might be doing to her.” Gon was glad to feel Killua’s shudders subsiding.

 

But then Killua turned in his arms and looked up at him, and his eyes were clouded. “What about next time?”

 

“Next time?” Gon asked, knowing what Killua meant but stalling for time to think of the right words to reassure him.

 

“Even if we manage to get Alluka away from him, Illumi is never going to stop chasing us. Not now, with our father gone.” He took a deep breath and said, “Not while he’s still alive.”

 

Gon looked down at Killua, holding his eyes, although it was difficult. These were the eyes of the Killua who had appeared on his doorstep on Whale Island weeks ago. Shattered. “Killua,” he said carefully, “are you honestly considering killing your brother?”

 

Killua ran a hand over his face. “I never have before. But now? If it comes down to him or Alluka? If it comes down to him or _you?”_

 

“It isn’t going to.”

 

“Gon, he’s playing his endgame here. I think it _is_ going to.”

 

“Fine,” Gon said, and he felt annoyance creeping into his tone. He couldn’t bear to see Killua give into this old fear of his brother, or the cruel designs of his family. “But think about this: they want you back. That’s all your family has ever wanted, for you to come back to the business and start killing again. So if you kill your brother in cold blood? Well, then they’ve got what they wanted, right? I mean, what if they set all of this up just for that?”

 

“What – to make me kill Illumi?”

 

Gon shrugged. “Can you really tell me they wouldn’t?”

 

Killua groaned. “When Father was alive, they wouldn’t have. But now? No, honestly, I can’t.”

 

“Okay then. We’re going to stop talking about killing Illumi.” The truth was, Gon would have no problem killing the man himself if he threatened Killua. He wasn’t going to say that to Killua, though; at least not right now, when he was so fragile and volatile.

 

“What are we going to talk about, then?” Killua asked.

 

“We aren’t going to talk,” Gon said, touching Killua’s lips with one finger. They were so soft, he had to close his eyes, draw a breath.

 

“Really, Gon?” Killua asked, though his tongue flicked out, licked the finger, making Gon shiver with desire. “We’re going to spend the next two days fucking each other senseless? _That’s_ your plan?”

 

“My plan is to keep you calm until I can’t anymore. And staring out the window, or at a map of East Gorteau, which we’ve already looked at a hundred times, isn’t going to do that. But tell me if you have a better idea.”

 

Killua sighed, but his eyes were soft again, even warm. “Not really. Gon…” He reached up, shoved his fingers into Gon’s hair.

 

Gon couldn’t help but sink down onto him. “Killua?”

 

“Whose turn is it, anyway?”

 

Gon could only laugh.

 

3

           

Later that day, they opened a large packing crate, planning to empty it and use it to sneak off the ship when they arrived in West Gorteau. When they saw what was inside it, however, they both froze.

 

“That is…a lot of guns,” Gon said at last.

 

“It is,” Killua agreed. “Let’s see what’s in the other crates.” They split up, prying the tops off the crates and rummaging inside each one.

 

“What did you find?” Killua asked when they met again by the original one. “Guns,” Gon said. “Ammunition. Grenades. What are they all for?”

 

“Gon,” Killua sighed, “didn’t your high school cover current events? Hell, did you ever turn on the TV?”

 

“We don’t have a TV,” Gon answered, shrugging. “And yeah, I guess I learned about current events…but I still don’t understand what that has to do with all of these weapons.”

 

“Okay, current events 101: there’s been a cold war raging among the nations of the Mitene Union ever since East Gorteau disintegrated.”

 

“I thought the countries in the Mitene Union took over East Gorteau together.”

 

“That was the party line. But do you really think they’d divide the spoils equally and amicably?”

 

“So they’re at war.”

 

“Not officially. But unofficially, very much so.”

 

“Then who is all of this stuff for?”

 

Killua shrugged. “Obvious answer? West Gorteau, since that’s where we’re going. But they could be a shipment for some crime lord selling to another country. There’s no way to know – and it doesn’t really matter. The point is, getting off this ship, or out of wherever it lands, might not be as easy as we thought. A cargo like this is going to have a heavy guard attached.”

 

“So we aren’t hiding in a packing crate after all?”

 

“No. We are. It’s just what comes after that that I’m not sure about. We’ll probably end up in a warehouse, and the warehouse will have security…”

 

“We can get past a few guards.”

 

Killua frowned. “A few, yes. Maybe even ten. But I think it’s more likely that we’ll be facing an army.”

 

“Well,” Gon said, frowning, “there are a lot of weapons here. I guess we could use them if we had to.”

 

“Maybe. But I don’t really want to announce our presence to Illumi until we have to. _If_ we have to.”

 

“So what do we do?”

 

“Wait,” Killua sighed. “See what the situation is when we land. And hope to hell there’s a way out of it.”

 

*

 

They landed in the afternoon of the fourth day. They’d debated hiding, waiting until nighttime and then sneaking off the ship, but in the end they decided that the risk of being found while the cargo was unloaded was too high. Killua was also worried that the ship might be locked down, trapping them onboard, so in the end they hid inside the packing crate they’d emptied days earlier. It was unloaded with the other crates into the damp heat of a tropical afternoon, and then moved to someplace dark but even hotter. As Killua had predicted, there seemed to be many people working to empty the ship, and their voices continued to chatter on outside even when they’d shut the door to what must be a warehouse.

 

When they were certain enough they were alone to chance looking out, Gon and Killua found themselves in a dim space stacked with crates. Gon shoved the lid of their own crate all the way back and set it on the floor, and they climbed out, stretching stiff muscles.

 

“I guess we won’t just be walking out of here,” Gon said softly, looking toward the bright outline of a large sliding door, beyond which they could hear men’s voices talking and laughing. “And we don’t even know where ‘here’ is.”

 

“No,” Killua agreed. “But let’s see if we can find out.” He gestured to Gon to approach the door, and they crouched by the wall on one side of it, listening. The men were speaking in the language of West Gorteau – Gon knew enough to identify it, but not to understand it.

 

“Do you speak it?” he whispered to Killua.

 

“Only a few words,” Killua whispered back. “I think they’re just telling dirty jokes.”

 

Gon sighed. “Should we look for another way out of here?”

 

Killua shook his head. “There’ll be patrols. And if this is a commercial airfield, or even a military one, there will be people everywhere.”

 

“So what, then?”

 

“Let’s wait. See if someone starts speaking something we can understand.”

 

They waited a long time in the close, relentless heat, huddled by the door, poised to run and hide if anyone came to open it. The group of guards by the door switched over once, and then, toward evening, again. At last, in the third group, they picked out two men speaking the Hunter language. Gon listened carefully, his keen ears pulling out the conversation from the tangle of others.

 

“…transport will come tonight.” One of the guards was saying.

 

“That’s fast.”

 

“They don’t want to leave the shipment here too long. This warehouse is supposed to be empty right now. Anyone could requisition it at any time. Gotta move the cargo east as soon as possible.”

 

“Great. So we’ll be loading crates onto trucks all night.”

 

“Hey, at least we’ll get paid overtime…”

 

The speakers moved off, until even Gon couldn’t pick out their words anymore. He looked at Killua, who was looking back, his eyes indigo in the failing light. “Did you catch all of that? I didn’t.”

 

Gon grinned. “I think,” he said, “we just got ourselves a ride to East Gorteau.”


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Killua and Gon reach old East Gorteau and the angst begins to creep, and things start to get dicey for Joji and Alluka.

**The Former Republic of East Gorteau**

1

 

Gon and Killua rode in the packing crate in one of the convoy of trucks until Killua’s phone’s GPS told them that they were near the former Royal Palace, outside of Peijin. It was far from an auspicious place to disembark, but Killua was fairly certain that Illumi wouldn’t have taken Alluka all the way into the capital, which was clearly where the trucks were headed. He would want her somewhere deserted, secluded, where she would be entirely at his mercy. Where better than a recent war zone, full of ruined buildings?

 

“You ready, Gon?” he asked.

 

Gon drew a breath, let it out. “Ready.”

 

Killua watched as Gon activated his zetsu, his form turning transparent, leaving a sudden void where his aura had been. Good: Killua had been afraid that nerves would make it difficult for Gon to fully conceal himself. He called on his own zetsu, and then they pushed out the side panel of the crate that they’d loosened earlier. They jumped down from the truck and crouched in the scrub at the side of the road as the convoy passed.

 

When the last of the trucks disappeared over the horizon, Gon and Killua stood up and looked around. They were in the midst of a wide, barren plain, blue as a snowfield in the light of the full moon. All around it, stars ate up the sky. A mountain range skeined across the far horizon, but the terrain around them was flat. There was no tree cover, only patches of brush dotted here and there across the moonlit expanse.

 

Killua looked at Gon. In the stark light his face seemed leaner, older, the plains and hollows of his features more defined. He was gazing at the mountain range, clearly lost in thought. Killua touched his cheek and Gon turned to him, offered him a faltering smile.

 

“You okay?” Killua asked.

 

“I’m okay,” Gon said.

 

“Give me your pack.”

 

With a bemused look, Gon un-slung it and handed it to Killua. Killua opened it, tipped out its contents, turned it inside-out and then, with the claw Gon had not seen him summon since they reunited, he carefully cut the stitches of a pouch sewn into its base. He pulled out a plastic bag with a piece of fabric inside it, and handed it to Gon.

 

“What is this?” Gon asked as Killua re-filled his pack.

 

“One of Alluka’s headbands,” Killua said. “I took it before I left the house. If anything still smells like her, it’s that.”

 

Gon looked up at him, stricken. “You hid it from me? You think I would have wasted it?”

 

“No,” Killua sighed deeply. “I hid it from _me,_ because _I_ would have wasted it. I’d have asked you to use it too soon. I sewed it into your pack before we left as a promise to myself. I couldn’t go rummaging through your things without at least thinking twice.”

 

“Killua,” Gon said gently.

 

“I know myself, Gon,” he answered, not meeting Gon’s eyes. “If I’d kept it, I would have made the wrong decision. I’m trusting you now not to.”

 

Gon’s eyes were bottomless in the moon shadows. After a moment he opened the bag, sniffed it quickly and then sealed it again. “I understand. I won’t take it out again until I know that it will help us.”

 

Killua nodded, unable to speak. Gon circled him with his arms, held him for a moment, and then he let go. “She’s that way,” he said, pointing east.

 

2

 

The next evening, Joji brought Alluka’s dinner – the only meal she’d been given that day. He offered her a brilliant smile, which she had begun to return when she realized that the magpie wasn’t on his shoulder. “Where is Miyako?” she asked, taking the tray from him.

 

“I sent her with a message to my mother,” Joji answered. “Trying to get her to leave again.”

 

“I thought you said that there was no way she would ever leave.”

 

Joji sighed. “I don’t think she will. But with your brother and his friend so close, I’m worried about what might happen to her. You know, if we have to fight Illumi.”

 

Alluka frowned, puzzled. “Why would anything happen to your mother? Gon and Killua won’t go to her, they’ll come here, for me.”

 

Joji cocked his head, and Alluka felt as if her blood turned to ice, because she recognized that gesture; but it wasn’t Joji’s. “Mmm,” he said, and now his voice was cold and gloating, “I’m sure you’re right. I wonder what their chances are, though, if we take two of you out of the equation?”

 

“Illumi?” she whispered, and he laughed humorlessly, pulling pins out of his body until Joji disappeared and Illumi stood before her. His eyes were black pits in the dim, flickering light.

 

“Really, Alluka, I gave you too much credit when I said that you weren’t stupid,” he said. “I even warned you. I told you to beware of emotion. When will you learn to listen to me?” Dipping an arm out the door, he dragged Joji into the tower.

 

The boy had clearly been beaten, and he was bound hand and foot with silver shackles. They looked fine as jewelry, but Alluka had no doubt that they were nen-infused and would be impossible to break. Illumi tossed Joji into the room. He fell hard onto the stone floor. To his credit, he remained silent, though his bruised face contorted in pain.

 

“Joji!” Alluka cried, scrambling to his side, helping him to sit up as Illumi watched them impassively.

 

“Yes, Joji. Perfect little pawn. How could you not have realized that’s all he was?” Illumi asked. “Why would I ever involve someone else in our family affairs unless it was to put you at my mercy?”

 

“And you disguised yourself as him why, exactly?”

 

Illumi shrugged. “I wanted to be certain that you trusted him. Now I’m certain. So. Time to start talking, or you’ll have more than a bird’s blood on your hands.”

 

Illumi reached into his coat, brought something out, and tossed it on the ground at Alluka’s feet. It was Miyako, still and shrunken, her neck angled like a broken twig. Alluka let out a small cry and then snatched up the bird’s body, cradling it to her chest. Joji was looking away.

 

“I have associates at Joji’s mother’s house right now,” Illumi continued, “and believe me, if you make any trouble, they are prepared to cause her a lot of pain before they kill her. Let’s begin with you telling me about your hatsu. Once I know what you can do on your own, we’ll discuss Nanika.”

 

Alluka swallowed hard around the cold lump in her throat, tears pricking her eyes as she clutched Miyako’s body, trying not to give in to emotion. There was something off, here. The crack she’d sensed in Illumi’s assurance was still there, and if anything, what he’d done to Joji proved it was wider than she’d thought. If he was trying to use him to force her hand, it could only be because he had something to fear from Killua and Gon.

 

At the same time, though, she couldn’t risk the life of an innocent woman on speculation. Maybe if she told Illumi what her hatsu was, it would buy her time to think of a way out of this? She didn’t know. She was dizzy with hunger, riddled with conflicting emotions, her mind scrambled with all of the days of trying to second-guess Illumi. “I – ” she began, with no real idea of what would come next.

 

But Joji interrupted, “No! Don’t tell him anything!”

 

“But your mother…” Alluka began.

 

“We don’t know that he’s telling the truth about these ‘associates,’” Joji said to Alluka, his tone grim. “We don’t even know that she’s still alive.” To Illumi, he said: “I want proof that my mother is alive and unharmed before Alluka tells you anything.”

 

Illumi smiled, gave a short, cold laugh. “Do you actually think you are in a position to make demands?”

 

“He might not be,” Alluka answered, “but I am. He’s a pawn? Fine. But since you’ve lied about everything else, I want proof his mother is alright.”

 

“Or I could just to start torturing him.”

 

“You can try,” Joji said, “but you won’t get very far.”

 

“Because you can heal yourself?” Illumi asked. “Believe me, I can work fast enough to make you forget how.”

 

“But you can’t work fast enough to stop this,” Joji rejoined. Alluka watched a wave of burnished aura wash over Joji, and then he grew still, unmoving, barely breathing, his eyes glassy.

 

Illumi slapped Joji, but he didn’t react. Illumi’s eyes widened. “What is this, Alluka?” he demanded.

 

“I don’t know,” she answered, as baffled as Illumi. “Joji?” she asked, shaking him, _“Joji?”_

 

Illumi pulled a long, thick needle from behind his ear and shoved it into Joji’s cheek.

 

“Illumi!” Alluka cried, horrified, but Joji still didn’t move.

 

The siblings stared at the inert boy. Abruptly, Joji shook himself and said, “So you see, it won’t do any good. Whatever happens to me in my trance state, I’ll neither feel it nor respond to it.”

 

“I could simply kill you,” Illumi said.

 

“Try it,” Alluka said. “See if Nanika will talk to you then.”

 

Illumi glared at the two of them, a muscle working in his jaw. Then he pulled another set of shackles out of his pocket and told Alluka, “Fight me, and his mother dies.”

 

Alluka held still as he pulled the shackles tight around her wrists and ankles. Then he picked up the lantern, turned and left, locking them both in without another word.

 

“Joji, what – ” Alluka began when he was gone. But Joji shook his head, his eyes warning her to stay silent.

 

A few long minutes passed, and then a familiar flutter of wings sounded at the window, and a magpie alighted between the bars. Alluka looked down at the dead bird in her hands, and then at the living one.

 

“What…but…Miyako?” Alluka asked.

 

“I saw Illumi changing his appearance earlier, to look like me,” Joji said wearily. “I didn’t have time to warn you before he caught me, but I had enough time to send Miyako to my mother with a message telling her that she was in danger, and to get help and hide.” He paused, drew a shallow breath. _Broken ribs?_ Alluka wondered.

 

Joji continued, “Illumi told me that he’d caught Miyako and killed her, but when I saw that bird’s body, I knew that it wasn’t hers. I _know_ Miyako. And Miyako knows better than to let him catch her. So we’re still a step ahead of him.”

 

Alluka looked down at the dead magpie, and then set it aside carefully. “What about your mother?”

 

“Miyako says that she’s safe, and hidden somewhere Illumi isn’t likely to find her. That’s as much as I thought it was safe to know. You know, in case Illumi…” He glanced at her, clearly not wanting to speak the words.

 

“I understand. But if she’s gone, why did you send Illumi to get her?”

 

“To buy time for Miyako to warn Killua and Gon.”

 

Alluka shook her head. “We don’t even know if they’re anywhere near here!”

 

“They are. Their airship landed in West Gorteau this afternoon. Umm…I hate to ask this, but could you reach into my right pocket? The message I wrote for them is in there.”

 

Alluka managed to twist her wrists enough to dig into his pocket and pull out a small scroll of baking parchment. She couldn’t look at it, but she could feel it: it wasn’t even as wide as her palm. “How can you have explained our situation on here?”

 

Joji smiled – not his sunlight smile, but one of soft encouragement. “I didn’t even try. I only told them the basics. But I also told Miyako to talk to Gon. Let’s hope he can understand her.”

 

_A bird?_ she wanted to scream. _We’re going to trust everything to a bird, and the possibility that Gon will understand her?_

 

Without warning, Nanika flew out of her, an angry wraith with streaming neon eyes. _She is not just a bird!_ she cried. _I told you at the beginning that she would help us, and she will help us!_

 

Alluka gaped at her. She could count the times Nanika had been truly angry with her on one hand.

 

“Is she…okay?” Joji asked, looking warily at Nanika.

 

“No. She’s mad at me, and she has a right to be. Nanika,” Alluka said to her, “I’m sorry. You’re right, we need to trust Miyako.” Nanika hovered in front of her for a moment, still crackling with anger. Then she dispersed and quickly coalesced again, this time into the form of a magpie. She flew to the window and then perched there beside the real bird, looking out.

 

“You don’t trust Miyako?” Joji asked softly.

 

Alluka sighed. “It isn’t that I don’t trust her. Just that we can’t assume that she’ll find Gon and Killua in time.” She shook her head. “Look – does this note warn them off?”

 

“No,” Joji said. “Should it?”

 

“Yesterday? Maybe. Now…I just hope to hell that they’ll get here before Illumi comes back. Because when he finds your mother missing, Illumi _will_ come after you,” she said. “He’ll kill you to make me do what he wants me to, and I can’t watch him do that.”

 

Joji said, “If it comes down to it, Alluka, you’ll have to.”

 

“I can’t let you die for me!” she said, tears finally spilling in earnest.

 

He smiled gently at her. “You said it yourself: countless numbers will die if Illumi gains control of Nanika. I can’t let that happen.”

 

“Joji…”

 

“But it isn’t going to come to that. Have faith, Alluka. Give the message to Miyako.” He whistled the bird inside.

 

Reluctantly, Alluka offered the scroll to her. She took it in her beak, and looked at her master. “Go, now,” he said softly. And then he said something else in his own language, which Alluka didn’t understand. But the tone was clear enough. He was speaking words of love, and encouragement. _Not good-bye. He couldn’t be saying good-bye…_

 

When he fell silent, Miyako gave him one more, long look, her eyes glowing glass beads in the moonlight. Then she fluttered to the window, touched her beak to Nanika’s, and flew away into the night.

 

“Now what?” Alluka asked tremulously when she was gone.

 

Joji took a deep breath. “Now, I need to heal myself. I won’t be much use to anyone in this state.”

 

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

 

Joji looked at her with the eye that wasn’t swollen shut. Despite the welts and bruises, his expression was shy. “It’s going to hurt. Would you…would you hold my hand?”

 

Alluka turned and twined her fingers through Joji’s. She squeezed as his aura arced out, and he stifled the first cry.

 


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Gon and Killua finally reach their destination...but something is very wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So we're in the final stretch now, and I just wanted to thank each and every one of you who's followed me this far, in particular the ones who've written to tell me that you love this story. Given I've never written anything so long or complicated before (at least for fandom) and I had no idea how it would be received, those kudos and notes of thanks and encouragement really do mean everything to me. Come chat with me on tumblr or discord - I'm glittercracker in both places! <3

**The Former Royal Palace**

1

 

The moon was high and bright when Gon and Killua reached the ruins of the Royal Palace. Gon knew that’s what it was by the residual scents of rock dust and burning and death. If he’d been going on sight alone, he wasn’t sure that he would have recognized the place. The towers and walls had crumbled almost to nothing, their remains covered in thick vines and vegetation.

 

“Gon?” Killua asked, laying a hand on his arm.

 

Gon hadn’t realized that he’d stopped walking until he heard Killua’s voice. “It’s okay,” he said. “ _I’m_ okay.”

 

“Are you sure?”

 

 _Am I?_ Memories were flooding back in a confused jumble. His heart rate and breathing had quickened, but that was only to be expected. His aura was still fully under his control. Most importantly, there was no sense of rage, or even fear. Would that still be true, he wondered, when they got closer to their destination? Because he was certain now of where they were headed. Was Killua?

 

“I’m sure,” he said at last. “I promise you I am. But Killua…she isn’t here.”

 

“We’re close, though…” Killua said after a long pause, his tone a mixture of pain and resignation.

 

Gon glanced at him. “Yeah,” he said. “We’re close. She’s that way.” He pointed east and slightly south, in the direction of the city. It was also the direction of a jagged black seam of forest with snow-capped mountains rising behind it, a backdrop burned permanently into his memory.

 

Killua nodded, and then drew a breath. “Gon, you can still say no. Wait for us here.”

 

“Killua,” Gon interrupted, turning to meet his eyes. They were silver in the moonlight, his hair like wisps of dandelion down, his skin smooth and luminous as new snow. Gon wanted to touch him, to kiss him, to comfort him with something more than words. But right now, words were what Killua needed. So he said, “I promised I’d go anywhere you went, and I meant _anywhere.”_

 

Killua shut his eyes, clenched his hands. “But this isn’t how you should have to prove that promise,” he said, voice leaden. “Illumi chose this place to incapacitate you, so that he could control us.”

 

“He may _think_ that he’s in control,” Gon said, “but I’m not the child I was. And I _will not_ be undone by him.”

 

“How can you know that?” Killua asked, his voice shredded. “I don’t even know if _I_ can resist him!”

 

“I know because of this,” Gon said, peeling one of Killua’s fists open, weaving their fingers together. He raised their linked hands, kissed the back of Killua’s. “Illumi doesn’t love anybody. He doesn’t know the meaning of the word. But we do. Alluka does. You and I were always stronger together. So were you and Alluka. You have to trust that.”

 

Killua laughed grimly. “You shouldn’t be the one comforting me.”

 

“Why not?” Gon asked, meeting his eyes earnestly, forcing Killua to look at him.

 

His face was tense, his eyes despairing. “Because I’m dragging you back into hell.”

 

“No, you’re not. I’m walking there with you. By your side, by choice. And it was your hell, too. So if you need me to comfort you, then that’s what I’ll do.” Gon cupped Killua’s cheek with his free hand. “Killua, this is what I meant when I said ‘forever.’ There is no should or shouldn’t about us. There aren’t rules to me loving you. I’ll be what you need when you need it, just like you will be for me. And no one but you and me get to say what that is.”

 

Killua shut his eyes and leaned into Gon’s palm. “I’m not sure I deserve you.”

 

Gon shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. You’re stuck with me. So? Ready to go kick your brother’s ass?”

 

Killua smiled, and kissed his palm, and they turned toward the dark line on the horizon.

 

2

 

They traveled quickly until they reached the forest. Once they were among the trees they slowed down, attentive to the possibility of ambush. Eerie silence closed in on them. There was no sound of birds or animals or insects, but Killua also couldn’t sense any nen-users’ auras.

 

“This is creepy,” Gon said in a hushed voice. “It makes me think of the first time we came to this country, when Meleoron was following us.”

 

“At least Meleoron wouldn’t be looking for a fight,” Killua answered.

 

“I don’t think anyone else is either…not here, anyway.”

 

Killua sighed. “Do you still have her trail?”

 

“Yes,” Gon said. “It’s faint, but it’s there. Plus there are other signs - broken branches, bits of thread…” He pulled a sea-green filament from a wedge of bark. “This is from her clothes, right?”

 

Killua looked at it briefly, shut his eyes. “Right. And it’s all still leading…?”

 

“Yes.”

 

Killua nodded, and he followed Gon when he began to move again. It was hard to resist the urge to rush him, but the forest was thick and dark and Killua knew that Gon’s senses here were better than his. He also knew that approaching Illumi quickly would be rash. If there was any chance of scoping out his hiding place before confronting him, they needed to preserve it.

 

As they traveled the terrain became increasingly uneven, folding into low but steep hills and valleys. They stopped once to eat and drink and then again, toward dawn, when the moon had set and the eastern sky begun to brighten. They stood on a stony ridge. Across from them was another ridge, clad in evergreen trees, with a building silhouetted at its top. Part of it was ruined, but the rest stood austere against the brightening sky, flagged by several square towers and topped by a kind of steeple. There were no lights in its windows, no sign of life anywhere.  

 

“That’s it,” Gon said softly.

 

 _Yes, that’s it,_ Killua thought. _The place where your heart first broke. Where you challenged that monster and sold yourself to grief and rage for a revenge that changed nothing. Where I almost lost you. Where I_ did _lose you…_

 

“And she’s there?” Killua asked, though he knew the answer to that – had known it since Estril. He simply didn’t want to think about the rest: to look at the bare patch of forest beyond the old Hunter hideout where nothing new had grown, despite five years having passed since it burned. To remember indigo and crimson blood flying, mixing with so many hopeless tears, or Gon’s amber eyes blank with bloodlust and despair.

 

Gon nodded. “She’s in there. But I’m not quite sure where.” He and Killua looked around in the rising light. The thatched roofs of a village showed in a clearing a few miles away. Killua didn’t remember it – it must have been built after the war.

 

“Maybe – ” Killua began, but he stopped speaking abruptly as a medium-sized black bird flew toward them, alighting in front of them and neatly settling its white-and-teal-streaked wings. It dropped a small scroll of paper at their feet. “What the hell?” he asked.

 

But Gon was smiling. “She’s a magpie.” He reached for the rolled paper.

 

“Gon, don’t, it could be – ”

 

Too late. Gon was already unrolling the little scroll. She fluttered up to his shoulder to perch there, looking down at the scroll as if she were reading it along with Gon and Killua. It said, in unpracticed Hunter script:

 

“To Killua and Gon. Illumi is holding Alluka in the old Hunter hiding place, in the tallest tower. He watches all the time. I believe he has allies in the area. He has not learned Alluka’s secrets yet. I will help you if I can when you get here, but I don’t think he trusts me anymore. I’m Joji. My bird is Miyako. I hope that Gon can speak to her, she can tell you much more than I can. And I hope that it will be enough for you to trust me. I would do anything for Alluka.”

 

Killua read and re-read the final sentence in dismay. This unknown person was as good as declaring love for his sister. How long had they known her? How well _could_ they know her? Did they even realize –

 

“Killua,” Gon said calmly, stuffing the scroll into his pocket, “why are you worrying?”

 

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Killua asked. “A bird brings us a note from someone we know nothing about – ”

 

“Except that they obviously care about your sister,” Gon interrupted in the same, calm voice. “And they said they’re trying to help her.”

 

“Illumi could have sent that note,” Killua pointed out.

 

“But he didn’t,” Gon said. “This note came from someone you can trust.”

 

Killua drew a deep breath, trying to quiet his racing thoughts. “You know that because…the words smell honest?”

 

Gon laughed. “The words smell like paper and ink! No – I know it because Miyako loves…him?” He looked questioningly at the bird and then, after a moment, back at Killua. “Yes. Joji is a boy. A little older than Alluka. And this bird loves him. A bird never loves a human unless they’re trustworthy.”

 

“How do you know all this?” Killua asked with a skeptical look at the magpie.

 

“I don’t know. She’s just kind of...showing it to me?”

 

“I didn’t know you could read animals’ minds.”

 

“I can’t,” Gon said, “not really. I think it’s more her than me.”

 

Killua sighed. “Okay, well…what can she tell us?”

 

Once again, Gon grinned.

 

3

 

“Okay,” Killua said, “this bird told you _all_ of that?”

 

Gon shrugged, still sorting through the images in his mind. “I don’t think she’s exactly an ordinary bird.”

 

“Apparently not.” He shook his head. “So Alluka is in that tower,” he pointed to the largest of them, also the closest to them. “Illumi is holding both her and this guy Joji captive now…and he’s looking for Joji’s mother?”

 

“Yes. They made some kind of deal. Alluka won’t talk until they can see Joji’s mother is okay. But she’s not at home. She’s hiding in a cave in the woods. They did it to get Illumi out of the castle.”

 

“Let’s go then! If we’re fast, we can get Alluka out before Illumi gets back.”

 

Gon had been afraid of this. “Wait, Killua. It isn’t that simple. We’ve also got Joji and his mother to think about.”

 

Killua shook his head, his eyes incredulous. “Why? Once Alluka’s gone, they won’t mean anything to Illumi.”

 

“Right. And so he’ll have no reason not to kill them.”

 

“We can try to help them, but Alluka is the priority.”

 

“Well, yes,” Gon said patiently. “But Alluka cares about Joji. Otherwise he and his mother would already be dead. She might not be willing to just walk away from him.”

 

Gon could see Killua working to digest this. “Are you saying that Alluka has _feelings_ for this guy?”

 

Gon looked hopefully at Miyako, who kept pecking at the ground. _Great. Super helpful._

 

“Gon, _what_ has the bird showed you?” Killua’s gaze had turned into a glower.

 

Gon sighed. Alluka was the one topic on which Killua just couldn’t be reasonable, and the last thing any of them needed now was for Killua to fly off the handle. “They haven’t _done_ anything,” he said. “I mean, nothing like the things we do.” Seeing Killua’s eyes darken, Gon continued quickly, “They’ve never even kissed, okay? But he’s kind to her. Miyako says she likes him. And Nanika does too.”

 

“She’s showed him Nanika?” Killua asked incredulously.

 

“Killua,” Gon said, forcing his voice to stay even, although he was growing irritated, “she isn’t a little girl anymore. She’s making her own decisions, and if she trusts Joji with Nanika, then you have to accept that.”

 

“I don’t like any of this,” Killua grumbled.

 

At which point, Gon lost it. “Will you _please_ stop being an _idiot_?! We’re walking into a battle, Killua! From everything you’ve told me, Illumi’s probably got an army of foot-soldiers stuck full of needles ready and waiting for us, so are you really going to turn down the help of a nen-user who loves your sister?”

 

“He uses nen?” Killua demanded, aura beginning to shoot out around him in blue-white jags. He was so beautiful like this – his moon-white skin and frost-pattern hair, the electricity spinning blue tendrils around it all. But Gon’s ren was around him in an instant, all the same.

 

“Ah – yeah,” Gon said, backing away. “I guess I forgot to tell you that part. He’s a healer – ”

 

“Enough!” Killua said, the electricity re-drawing him in sharp lines. “Let’s go!”

 

*

 

To Gon’s relief, Killua didn’t make a Godspeed rush straight into the castle. He did set a punishing pace through the woods, though, that left them both covered in scrapes and bruises where sharp branches had caught them by the time they stopped at the edge of the forest surrounding the clearing. Killua’s aura still crackled out around him, bright and furious.

 

“That really isn’t too subtle,” Gon suggested, gesturing to it.

 

Killua looked down at himself and sighed. He reined in his aura until it was only zetsu. Gon had already done the same. “Sorry,” he muttered.

 

“I know you’re worried. But if we’re going for stealth, well…”

 

“Got it,” Killua said, gazing at the tower where his sister was imprisoned. He shook his head, turned back to Gon. “Okay. Clearly I’m not at my most rational right now. You have any ideas?”

 

Gon nodded. “First, we send Miyako to see what the story is. Who’s there, who isn’t.”

 

“Is Miyako even here?” Killua asked, a moment before the bird swooped down onto Gon’s shoulder. He blinked at her. “Did you call her?”

 

“No,” Gon said. “Joji told her to look after us.” Then he looked Miyako in the eye, picturing the questions he wanted to ask her, watching to make sure she understood before he gave her a small nod and she flew off toward the tower window, disappearing inside.

 

After a moment she fluttered out again, but rather than return to them, she flew back inside through the large, empty doorway on the ground floor. She was gone for many long minutes, but at last she emerged from an upper window and soared toward them, landing again on Gon’s shoulder.

 

“Well?” Killua asked impatiently. “What’s she saying?”

 

“Hold on,” Gon said, concentrating. The images flowed fast from her, dipping and swirling with the motion of flight until, abruptly, they stuttered and stopped on something that sent ice through his veins. It also made no sense, because it wasn’t something the bird could possibly have seen. At last, he said, “Alluka and Joji are okay, but they’re still locked in the tower. Illumi’s got them in shackles, and Joji is weak. Illumi beat him, and he used a lot of energy to heal himself.”

 

Gon watched Killua’s jaw tighten. “And Illumi?”

 

“Not back yet.”

 

“Is there anyone else in there?”

 

“Not that Miyako could see…but there was something else, Killua. I couldn’t really make sense of it, but she showed me you, and there was a feeling of cold, and evil, and…wrongness. It was the worst feeling you could imagine.”

 

“Well…was it just a feeling? Or was there some kind of warning?”

 

“I – don’t really know. I mean yes, it felt like a warning, but it was an image of you. And you were all wrong. Your eyes weren’t your eyes. They were empty. Cold. And your face was…blank?”

 

Gon watched Killua consider this, gazing at the tower. “Could Illumi have disguised himself as me, again? Is that what the bird saw?”

 

Gon shrugged. “Maybe. But how could he possibly have known what you’re wearing? Because you, or whoever she showed me, was dressed just like you. He even had the same scrapes and bruises.”

 

Killua sighed. “Maybe it’s just something she’s afraid of? Or she picked up from Alluka or the boy? I don’t know, Gon. I only know that we can’t let it stop us.”

 

Gon wanted to argue, but he didn’t know how. As Killua moved forward, though, Gon caught his hand.

 

“Is there more?” Killua asked, turning back to look at him.

 

 _Yes, there was more. There was so much more._ The sensation of looming danger surrounding Killua that Miyako had fed to him was impossible to put into words, but it was almost paralyzing. _Stop it,_ he told himself. After all, they’d known all along that this would be dangerous. _But…_ “Kiss me. Just once more.”

 

Gon could see Killua’s impatience, but also that he was trying to subdue it, for him. “Gon,” he said, “I know you’re scared. Why wouldn’t you be, after what happened to you here five years ago? But that’s in the past. Illumi isn’t here. We’ll get in and get Alluka out, the end.” He paused, studied Gon. “But I mean, if you can’t – ”

 

“No! That’s not it! I’m going with you. I just…I love you, and these last weeks have been the best weeks of my life, and whatever happens, I need to know that you thought so, too.”

 

Killua fisted the front of Gon’s shirt and pulled him in. Their mouths crashed together, inelegant but passionate, and as Gon tasted the sweetness of Killua’s tongue – _how was he always so sweet?_ – he wished that they were anywhere else. That this whole thing was already over. That the image of Killua’s eyes, cold and empty, weren’t branded into his mind.

 

But it wasn’t over, not yet, and breathless, they broke apart. Killua pressed his forehead to Gon’s, holding his eyes. “I thought so too, okay?” he said. “And I’m looking forward to a million more kisses once this is over. So. Ready?”

 

Gon nodded, not ready at all, and they stepped out of the shelter of the trees, toward the castle’s gaping front door.

 


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the inevitable showdown begins, and the inevitable angst ensues...
> 
> Because fiction is never written in a vacuum, I owe some thanks for Illumi's demand of Killua. The seeds of that idea came out of a discussion on the BB writer's server about the worst thing Illumi could wish for. Although I tweaked it a bit, I owe xyliane and losing_sanity_fast a lot for The Worst Wish Ever.
> 
> Also, next Thursday I'll be in Europe so the next chapter might get posted at a crazy time - but it will get posted!

**The Old Hunter Hideout**

1

 

It felt to Gon like stepping into the past. Aside from the section that had fallen into ruin, the old hideout hadn’t changed. The once-rich, timeworn furnishings hadn’t been touched. The austere statues of who-knew-what long-dead priests and warriors still looked down from their pedestals in magisterial silence. The same dusty stubs of candles stood in frozen flows of wax in their rusting stands. The place was steeped in a sepulchral chill despite the heat outside, and Gon shuddered, the creeping unease of Miyako’s wordless warning deepening with every step they took.

 

Killua led the way through the corridors with quick confidence. _Had he even been inside this place that last time?_ Gon wondered. But of course, it didn’t matter. He would be following his sense of Alluka’s aura, and the place wasn’t that big, for all its ostentation.

 

When they reached the stairway that led to the tower, Killua began to run, crying, “Alluka!”

 

“Killua!” Gon heard her call back, and then they were at the top of the stairs, standing in front of a doorway sealed by a metal door covered in inscriptions.

 

“Help me,” Killua said as he shoved against it, trying to force it open. The hinges whined, but the door held. Of course it did. Illumi wouldn’t make this prison so easy to break out of – or into. Whatever the inscriptions might mean, they were powerful.

 

“I’ll boost you,” Gon said, and he pushed his aura into Killua, whose own aura exploded into icy blue licks of flame around him. Killua slammed into the door. This time the hinges tore with a shriek, the slab of metal collapsing inward with a crash, landing only a few inches from the two prisoners.

           

Despite knowing that she was sixteen now, Gon had still held the picture of Alluka as a child in his head. So he was shocked to find her a beautiful young woman, almost as tall as he was, with Killua’s wide, blue eyes and pale skin and willowy build. Beside her stood a young man with frightened green eyes in a determined face. For a moment, the four of them just stared at each other. Then Killua rushed forward and scooped Alluka into his arms, the two of them clinging and crying for a few long moments before she pulled away, saying, “Quickly! We have to get out of here!”

 

Killua set his sister down and snapped her bindings as if they were made of thread. Then he looked at Joji with cool appraisal. “Do you want me to free him, too?” he asked her.

 

“Of course I do!” Alluka retorted.

 

“You’re sure he’s not working with Illumi?”

 

“Don’t be an ass, Killua!”

 

Sighing, Killua broke Joji’s bonds as well. “Now let’s go,” he said, and led the way out of the tower and down the stairs, through the front door.

 

They were just into the woods when Joji stopped abruptly, and then Alluka stopped too. “What is it?” Killua demanded.

 

“I can’t leave,” Joji said.

 

“Do you have any idea what Illumi will do to you when he comes back and finds Alluka gone?”

 

“I have a pretty good idea, yes,” Joji answered, sighing. “But I can’t leave here until I know that he hasn’t found my mother.”

 

“Then stay,” Killua said, exasperated, “and good luck to you.” He turned away.

 

“Killua,” Alluka said firmly, and he stopped, turned back, his eyes glimmering with the beginnings of anger.

 

“Alluka?” he asked.

 

“Joji risked his mother’s life to buy you time,” she said, her voice resolute as she slipped a hand into Joji’s. “We need to make sure she’s safe before we leave.”

 

“Alluka, we can’t stay here!”

 

She glanced at Joji and then back at her brother. “Listen, Killua – ” she began, but she never had the chance to finish the sentence. A dart came flying through the air, and Alluka dodged it with millimeters to spare. The next moment all of them had their ren at full force, and were looking for the source of the projectiles that now stippled the air.

 

“Shit,” Killua said. There was a group of people approaching them, formed into a half-circle. When he turned, Gon saw another group closing in from the other side. They moved with a methodical purpose that told him they must be under the influence of Illumi’s needles, hurling darts with mechanical precision. Gon reached out and caught one. It looked just like one of Illumi’s round-headed pins, though weightier, and with fletching at the end for flight.

 

“I know those people,” Joji said with muted horror. “I know them all…”

 

“You don’t know them anymore,” Killua told him. “They’re Illumi’s army now, and we need to move before they surround us!”

 

They broke in two directions, Joji moving toward the castle rather than away from it, and Alluka following him. _The wrong direction,_ Gon thought as he followed Killua away from the ruin and toward the village they had glimpsed from the woods.

 

“Alluka!” Killua cried. “What are you doing?”

 

“Joji’s mother – ” she answered, but the rest was lost in the noise of the needle-people moving. They were moving slowly, and Gon and Killua had soon run beyond the range of their darts. They stopped for a moment then.

 

“Well, you were right about Illumi having an army,” Killua said grimly. “These must be the local villagers and farmers.”

 

“So why isn’t he here?” Gon asked, the chill of Miyako’s warning washing over him again.

 

“I don’t know, and I really don’t want to stay to find out! Let’s get Alluka and go!”

 

“All right,” Gon said, and against everything screaming inside of him that this was wrong, wrong, _wrong,_ he followed Killua back toward the castle.

 

The needle-people came at them, but it wasn’t difficult to fight them off. In fact, it was disturbingly easy. Within five minutes they were back in the castle yard, dodging darts and tossing attackers away from Alluka and Joji. Alluka was fighting well, but Joji’s efforts were half-hearted, mostly deflection – no doubt, Gon thought, because he knew these people, and couldn’t quite believe that they had turned against him.

 

They were close to Alluka and Joji when it happened – only a few yards away. Killua was focused on getting to Alluka, and Gon was facing the other direction, fighting to keep the seemingly endless stream of needle-people off his back, when a figure cut through the ranks of the shuffling villagers. It smiled as it moved toward him, a yellow-eyed, white-haired nightmare. Its face was almost sweet, except for a predatory tinge to the smile and eyes; its limbs were almost graceful, except for their weird, doll-like joints.

 

Gon froze, his ren dropping from him like water. The bright morning and the needle people and his friends and lover were gone. Instead he was drowning in a moonlit night, snowy mountains silver in the background above a dark fringe of forest. Power was tearing through him like a brushfire, blindingly bright and impossible to contain. A blink. When he opened his eyes a cloud had eclipsed the moon and he was pounding his fists into flesh, tearing through bone and sinew, covered in blue-black blood, and even though the creature beneath him was long since dead, broken beyond repair, he couldn’t stop the beating because it was the only thing that made the pain raging through him bearable –

 

He heard someone call his name but it was vague, distorted, as if it traveled through layers of water. He knew the voice that spoke it – screamed it? – but he couldn’t unlock from the pain and power to heed it. And then something was jolting through him, blue and burning, and the cloud-ridden moon and bloody, beaten body disappeared. Bright daylight engulfed him and he was on his knees, gazing up into the face he had obliterated all those years ago. Its smile was the insipid smile of a puppet, eyes wide and unblinking as it gazed down at him and said, “Hello, Gon. How lovely to meet you again.”

 

No. No, it couldn’t, _he_ couldn’t, and he was spiraling back toward that terrible night, and Killua was screaming his name and he didn’t know if it was memory or reality, and he didn’t know if it mattered because darkness was flickering at the corners of his vision, old, cold stars waiting to swallow him and –

 

“ _Gon get away from him!”_

 

His head snapped around, and there was Killua, blasting his way through needle-people, trying to reach him. But all Gon could think was, _Him? Pitou isn’t a him, Pitou isn’t even human_ – and then everything stopped. The world was suddenly so still that he might have believed that time itself had arrested, except for the sharp, icy prick of a needle against his neck. Somehow, this tiny pain was enough to bring him back to himself.

 

He looked around at the needle-people standing still and silent, awaiting orders. Alluka and Joji were also frozen, staring at him in horror. But it was nothing compared to the dismay in Killua’s eyes as he gazed across the few feet that separated them, lightning diminishing around him as his hands fell slowly to his sides.

 

“Wise choice, little brother,” Pitou said behind Gon. “And if you don’t want your lover to die, you will stay right there, and contain your aura.”

 

“Brother?” Gon heard himself asking, again from a remove. This time, he knew that it wasn’t just his own distress – there was something swimming in his blood, making him sluggish and confused. Something, no doubt, on the point of that needle touching his flesh.

 

“Gon,” Killua said slowly, carefully, “that isn’t Pitou. Pitou died years ago. That’s Illumi, making himself look like Pitou, and holding a poisoned needle to your neck. So whatever you do, _don’t move.”_

 

Gon shut his eyes, willed himself still.

 

“Well, you have grown up, Killu, haven’t you?” the monster behind Gon said in a round, cordial tone, obscenely at odds with its appearance. “Good advice, really, and an excellent guess. Because if this needle goes any further, it will enter Gon’s carotid artery, and the concentrated poison on the upper part of it will kill him within minutes. I believe he is already feeling the effects of the diluted solution on the tip. Gon?”

 

“Yes,” Gon choked out.

 

“Do you understand, Killu?” Illumi asked.

 

Gon watched Killua swallow hard. Then Killua said, “I understand that much. But what do you want?”

 

“Alluka? Care to answer that for your brother who loves you so very much?”

 

Gon watched Alluka’s eyes shut, and then open again, wet with tears. She clutched Joji’s hand, and then she said, “Killua…” Her voice broke, and she had to begin again. “Killua, he wants us to – ”

 

“It’s alright, Alluka,” Killua interrupted. “We’ve always known what he wanted.”

 

“Have you?” Illumi asked, pulling pins out of his body until he looked like himself again. Gon hated himself then for having been taken in, having been deceived by such an obvious trick. Tears stung his eyes as Illumi continued, “I’m not sure that you’ve ever known what I really wanted.”

 

“You wanted to take Father’s place instead of me,” Killua said, his voice flat, even bored. “Fine. Take it. Isn’t it clear that I don’t want it?”

 

Illumi cocked his head. “You really think it’s that simple?”

 

Killua remained stubbornly silent.

 

Illumi rolled his eyes, pressing the needle harder against Gon’s neck. “Alluka, enlighten your idiot of a brother.”

 

All of them looked at Alluka. Tears were streaming down her face, and she was leaning on Joji. “Killua,” she said at last, “if we don’t tell him how to get free wishes from Nanika, he’s going to kill Gon.”

 

Gon watched Killua pause, and then turn to his brother. “You can’t,” he said simply. “Nanika has to love you for that to work, and she’ll never love you.”

 

For a moment, there was silence. And then Illumi spoke, his tone irritated but not, Gon felt, quite irritated enough: “So then, I still need you to make wishes for me.”

 

“Do you actually think that either of us would ever help you, if you hurt Gon?” Alluka demanded.

 

Illumi rolled his eyes. “Really, Alluka? Is that all you understood of what I told you at the beginning of all of this? You think I would attempt to cement my place in our family by blackmail alone?”

 

“If it’s not that,” Alluka answered, fear and defiance warring in her voice, “then what?”

 

Illumi sighed in exasperation. “Yes, I want free wishes. But not at the price of having to live with the two of you scheming to unseat me, let alone having to keep Killua’s lover with us as collateral. If Killua must be part of this bargain, then Killua must be unequivocally obedient to me.”

 

“You might force my hand,” Killua said, his aura beginning to shimmer around him despite Illumi’s warning, “but you’ll never make me stop hating you for it!”

 

“You think not?” Illumi said. “Well then, let’s put it to the test. I require you to make a request of Nanika. If you refuse – if _any_ of you refuse, including Nanika – then I will drive this needle home.”

 

Killua and Alluka exchanged a look: abject fear in identical blue eyes. Gon’s heart stuttered and his throat went dry.

 

“What request?” Alluka asked tremulously.

 

“Killua,” Illumi said, “please command Nanika to make you incapable of loving anyone but me.”

 

2

 

 

Silence rang louder than a bombstrike in Killua’s ears. Had he heard those words correctly? Was Illumi actually capable of the understanding of love needed to make such a request? Did it matter? He had Gon at virtual gunpoint, and Killua pinned with an expectant gaze.

 

Killua looked at Gon: his first friend, his beloved, the sun around which he’d revolved since the day they met. That beautiful bronze neck, still marked with his kisses, curved away from a filament of metal that spelled his death if Killua took one wrong step. All he knew for certain was that Gon couldn’t die for him. He couldn’t die at all, because Killua couldn’t live without him.

 

But then, wouldn’t granting Illumi’s request amount to the same thing?

 

“Don’t do it,” Gon said softly, resolutely. “Refuse. Destroy him, and then take care of Alluka – ” He broke off with a hiss as Illumi twisted the needle deeper into his skin.

 

Killua looked at his weeping sister, wrapped in Joji’s arms. Then he faced Gon. Once they locked gazes there was nothing left in the world but Gon’s eyes, bright and wet and swarming with equal parts love and anguish. The image of him swam, dissolving as Killua’s own eyes filled.

 

“You can’t ask me to watch you die,” Killua choked.

 

“Killua – my Killua,” Gon said, his voice like sun-warmed honey and so full of love that Killua lost any semblance of control, wracked with silent sobs. “I’d rather die a thousand times than sentence you to a loveless life. That would be asking me to watch _you_ die.”

 

“Don’t make me do this!”

 

“Killua,” Gon said gently, “it isn’t just about you and me. Alluka needs you.”

 

“No,” Alluka said, swiping at her eyes with a dirty sleeve. “Not at that price, Gon. I have enough blood on my hands to last a lifetime!”

 

“And you’ll have so much more if Killua makes that wish,” Gon said calmly.

 

“You have five seconds to command the parasite,” Illumi snapped at Killua, “or Gon dies.”

 

Killua bowed his head for a moment, and then looked up at Illumi. “Let me kiss them good-bye,” he said, his voice hitching.

 

Illumi laughed incredulously. “What do you take me for, Killua?”

 

Killua shut his eyes, images of the past few weeks with Gon and the previous years with Alluka jumbling through his mind in an oversaturated stream. He ached to hug his sister. But more than that he burned to feel Gon’s lips against his, to look into the depths of those honey-brown eyes and speak all of the words that he should have spoken when he had the chance. _My love. My light. My most precious friend…_

 

How could he do this? How _couldn’t_ he? He felt the two impossible questions closing in on him, all too familiar. Once, these opposing forces had made up the margins of his life. His mind cast back to those years he’d buried, the years he’d spent on murder when he was too young to know what it meant to live, let alone to die. Every one of those deaths he’d orchestrated was a travesty. Every one was a blister on his soul rubbed raw, oozing bitter liquid.

 

The past was the past, and he couldn’t undo it. He could, however, spare the people he loved his own residual guilt. He wouldn’t deal them death, but now the knife was at his own throat. He knew that he had to plunge it in, and it was hard. So very hard, when he had to look at the precious things he’d be losing as he did it. He had to remember how he’d managed it, before. Recall that strength of will. _Stop thinking,_ his child-mind told him. _Just stop thinking…_

 

His eyes snapped open. A single thought ran through his mind: _I will not watch them die._

 

“I’m sorry, Gon,” he said in a voice that didn’t sound like his own. Was this the monster he had once been, speaking? “Alluka, take care of him.” Looking at neither of them, he drew a deep breath and said, “Nanika, I command you to make me incapable of loving anybody but Illumi.”

 

Gon’s face twisted with grief, and Killua watched for Alluka’s eyes to go black: for Nanika’s cheerful, sickening affirmation. But none came. Alluka’s eyes remained blue. There was a beat of silence, and then Nanika hurled herself out of Alluka’s body with enough force to send Alluka skidding backward. Nanika took no form, instead hurtling toward Illumi in a black mass shot with crackles of blue. The next moment, Killua was on her heels.

 

Illumi’s eyes widened in shock as Nanika stopped centimeters from him, her form becoming a shadow of Alluka’s. “No,” she said out loud – the barest whisper, but unmistakable. Then she slammed herself into Illumi. He swayed as she raged within him, the needle still poised on Gon’s neck.

 

There wasn’t time for Killua to call up his aura. There wasn’t even time to think, only to react, and so he shoved Illumi without grace, with nothing but the intention of forcing him as far from Gon as possible. Illumi stumbled a step or two and then turned to him, a battle raging in his eyes in black and jags of blue. With a final thrust of will before Nanika claimed him, Illumi smiled, and drove the poisoned needle straight into Killua’s heart.

 

3

 

Gon held Killua, cradling him in his lap. He wasn’t sure how they had come to be like this, because the seconds after the needle had pierced Killua’s chest were a haze. He remembered dragging Killua away from the unconscious Illumi, ripping the needle out, but by then he was already losing consciousness.

 

Now Alluka and Joji were kneeling at his side. Alluka held one of Killua’s hands while pleading with Joji to heal him. Joji had his own hands on Killua’s chest where he’d torn his shirt open, glaring down at them with fierce concentration. But Gon barely registered any of it, unable to focus on anything except Killua, who was looking up at him with fading eyes and a sweet smile.

 

“I still love you, Gon,” he said dreamily. “The wish didn’t work.”

 

“I know,” Gon said, choking the words out through his tears. “And I’m so glad!”

 

“Why do I feel…so…strange?” Killua asked, his eyelids drooping despite his obvious effort to keep them open.

 

“Don’t worry about that,” Gon said as he shoved his entire aura at Joji, trying to boost his healing ability enough to counteract a poison so potent that even Killua could succumb to it. Illumi must have known that it would work against his brother. He must have chosen it with the possibility of using it on him. With the thought, rage rose in Gon, threatening to eclipse the grief – to eclipse everything. _No,_ he told himself. _I promised him, never again._

 

“You’re going to be fine,” he made himself say, although Killua’s lips had taken on a blue tinge, and there were purple half-moons under his eyes. He stroked Killua’s hair, wishing he could memorize every strand.

 

“My brightest one…” Killua said, reaching up to trace cold, trembling fingers down Gon’s cheek. “You always were…my light…my sun…” His eyes shut. His breathing was shallow.

 

“And you are whatever a moon has always meant,” Gon said softly. Killua’s hair was wet with his tears but he continued to caress it.

 

“Aren’t…making sense…”

 

“It’s something I read, once,” Gon told him, only half-hearing his own words. “A poem, for school. But I learned it all, because to me, it meant you.”

 

“Beautiful…so beautiful…my love…my always love…”

 

Gon struggled to keep his aura focused on Joji. “Fight it, Killua! Open your eyes. Please, open your eyes!”

 

But Killua’s eyes remained shut, the webwork of veins in their lids showing ever more vividly. Joji removed his hands from Killua’s chest. It was still rising and falling, but not enough. Not nearly enough.

 

Gon looked up at Joji. “Don’t stop! You _have to_ heal him!”

 

“I can’t,” Joji said, green eyes full of pain. “This is beyond me, even with your help.”

 

“Keep trying!” Gon cried.

 

“Gon,” Alluka said, her voice wracked with tears of her own. “He’s done his best.”

 

Gon looked up at her, his heart hot and red and bleeding inside of him. How, he wondered, had he ever thought that Killua’s silence was the worst pain he could face? How had he ever taken for granted the fact that Killua, even lost to him, still lived and breathed, somewhere?

 

“I can’t lose him, Alluka,” he grated out. “I only just found him again. I love him more than anything in this world and I just…can’t…”

 

Gon’s words dissolved into silent sobs. He leaned down and kissed Killua’s forehead, his cheeks, his lips, willing him to wake. To leap to his feet, and yell at him for embarrassing him in front of his sister. But he lay still in Gon’s lap, the little color that had been in his face draining away.

 

“No,” Alluka said after a moment, wiping her tears with sudden resolve, “you can’t. And I can’t either. At least not if there’s still something left to try.”

 

She moved to Illumi’s inert form, looked down into his black, empty eyes. “Nanika,” she said, “I need you.”

 

4

 

Alluka felt for her twin within her brother’s body, listening for any word, spoken or thought, which might mean that Nanika heard her and understood. There was nothing. When she reached for Nanika’s presence she felt only a cold, sweeping darkness, like a sea on a night with no moon.

_Nanika, answer me, please! I know that you’re in there, and I need you! Killua needs you!_

 

Still nothing. And as much as she was frustrated by Nanika’s silence, the hurt was worse. Had Nanika truly forgotten her? Was she honestly going to lose the only two people she’d ever loved in one clean, cruel sweep? _No. I can’t._

 

“Nanika!” she screamed out loud, beating on Illumi’s chest.

 

At last there was an answer. It didn’t sound in her mind, though, and it didn’t sound like Illumi. It was spoken in a weird, rasping voice, a repeat call of, “Nanika!”

 

Miyako flapped down out of the insolent bright sky, landed on Illumi’s shoulder. She looked up at Alluka for a moment, and then she jabbed Illumi in the chest, hard, with her beak. He gasped in a breath, and then turned his head to look at Alluka. His eyes were black – well, Illumi’s eyes were always black. But there was something different about them: a transparency, as if, dark as they were, the darkness was made up of layers of something translucent. It was also something wild and untamable. For the first time, Alluka had a glimmer of understanding of her family’s fear of her twin. _No time for that!_ she told herself.

 

“Nanika!” she cried. “Help us!”

 

“Nanika?” Illumi’s voice asked.

 

“That’s your name,” Alluka said, trying to keep the panic out of her tone. “Do you remember? Do you remember me? Alluka?”

 

Nanika’s eyes looked out of Illumi’s face, curious, uncomprehending. “Alluka. Know Alluka.”

 

“Yes!” she said, forcing herself not to shriek and shake her brother’s body. The last thing she needed now was to make Nanika angry. “It’s me. It’s _us._ Do you remember us?”

 

“Alluka…and Nanika. Us.” Nanika paused, raised a hand, studied it. “Not us.”

 

“It’s not quite the same,” Alluka agreed, pushing herself to patience. “But it’s still us. And we need to help Killua. We need to heal him. He’s dying.”

 

“Killua is dying.”

 

Even tone. Barely speculative. _Don’t lose control!_

“Yes. And Nanika, you love him. You love me. You need to help him, for both of us.”

 

There was a visible struggle raging in Illumi’s eyes. Was Illumi trying to reassert his control of his body? Was Nanika simply wrestling with herself – the part of her that remembered Alluka fighting the innate nature of her species, now that they were in different bodies? She didn’t know, and she didn’t know which would be more painful. All she knew was that the worst thing she could do now was rush Nanika.

 

Slowly, Illumi sat up. Alluka held her breath, poised to fight if he had returned to himself. But the eyes he turned on her were Nanika’s, and with a flood of relief, she saw recognition in them. “Alluka,” Illumi’s voice said. “Make a wish.”

 

For a moment her head spun in confusion. That wasn’t how it was meant to work. She had never been able to wish for herself. But then, none of this was how Nanika was meant to work. Alluka had changed her, and so maybe, now, a wish made to her twin without the predicated requests was possible?

 

Still, she had to ask. “Won’t there be a price?”

 

“No human will pay the price,” Nanika answered, her words stilted, as if she couldn’t quite figure out how to use Illumi’s vocal organs properly.

 

“Alluka,” Gon said, obviously straining for patience, “it has to be now.”

 

Alluka drew a breath and said, “Nanika, I wish for you to return Killua to the state he was before Illumi forced him to wish.”

 

A moment of silence; and then Nanika said, “‘Kay.”

 

She spiraled up and out of Illumi’s body, formless again but no longer laced with the angry blue. She settled over Killua like a blanket, gradually losing darkness and opacity until she was no more than a silvery shimmer. Then she rose off of him in wisps, like sunrise mist from a summer pond. She hovered over him as his breathing deepened and steadied, and the color returned to his cheeks, and finally, he opened his eyes.

 


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which this crazy story comes to a conclusion! Except for a little extra - an epilogue that I'm also going to post today because neither chapter is very long.

**The Old Hunter Hideout**

1

 

At first, Killua didn’t know where he was. He only knew that his head rested in Gon’s lap, and Gon was smiling down at him, although it looked like he had recently been crying. Alluka was clutching his hand and smiling too, but she was still crying. He felt as if something leaden he’d unknowingly carried within him had dissolved.

 

And then, gradually, Killua began to remember. Slowly, he sat up, blinking in the bright light and looking around at his friends and the faint cloud that was Nanika.

 

“He poisoned me,” Killua said, looking over at Illumi’s unconscious form. “How?”

 

“I guess there are one or two poisons you aren’t immune to,” Gon answered with a shaky laugh. “And to be perfectly fair, he wasn’t really in his right mind when he did it. Maybe he didn’t mean to.”

 

But Killua shook his head. “No. Illumi does nothing without reason. He chose that poison because he knew he might need to use it as a contingency plan. He was ready to kill me.”

 

“Maybe,” Gon said. “But Nanika saved you.”

 

They all looked up at Nanika’s wispy, drifting form. “You must be tired,” Alluka said to her. “You can come back inside now. Sleep, and recover.”

 

Sluggishly, Nanika took on Alluka’s form. She lowered herself until she was eye-to-eye with her twin, though her blue eyes were so faint they were hardly distinguishable from the rest of her. Killua waited for her to re-converge with his sister, but she didn’t, and he could tell from the look of deep concentration on Alluka’s face that they were talking to each other. Then Nanika was reaching out, brushing Alluka’s cheek with a misty hand as tears began to stream down them again.

 

“No – oh, no! Nanika!” Alluka said aloud. She reached out to grasp the wispy form, but her fingers ran through Nanika as if she were made of air. _“Nanika!”_ Alluka cried, and Killua was up and at her side, gathering her in his arms as she wailed.

 

“Alluka, what happened?” he asked her. “What did she tell you?”

 

“No…human…host,” Alluka managed in between hysterical sobs.

 

“She – can’t take a human host?”

 

Alluka shook her head. “It was…the price…”

 

And with a sickening wrench, Killua understood. “The price of healing me.”

 

“I thought Nanika didn’t take a price for healing,” Gon said.

 

“I think that maybe this was different,” Killua said, looking down at Alluka. “Because she had changed already, to be able to separate from Alluka. And then disabling Illumi must have been hard on her, never mind coming back out of him, then healing me… It was too much, wasn’t it? The only way she could do it was to pay with part of herself.”

 

Alluka nodded against his chest, heaving another shuddering breath. “Oh, Alluka,” he said, and then he simply held her. Without a host, Nanika would die. She had sacrificed herself so that he could live. The profundity of that, given what she was, was something he wondered if he would ever reconcile.

 

For now, though, it meant only this: Alluka had unwittingly paid for the life of one of the only two people she had ever called family with that of the other. And he had no idea whether he could ever be enough to level that balance.

 

Joji approached them, his bird on his shoulder. Killua was about to snap at him when Joji said softly, “I don’t mean to intrude, but I have an idea.”

 

“This isn’t the – ” Killua had begun, when Alluka interrupted.

 

“Can you heal her?” she asked, and the sudden, trembling hope in her tone was almost more than Killua could bear. Because if Joji hadn’t been able to save a dying human, how could he save a creature that humans barely understood?

 

“No,” Joji confirmed, and Killua had to repress the urge to hit him. Then he continued, “But what if there’s another way to save her?”

 

“Another way?” Alluka asked, clearly exhausted and confused.

 

“You said that the price she paid was never being able to take a human host again. But does her host have to be human?”

 

Alluka gave Killua a questioning look. “I – honestly don’t know,” she said.

 

He didn’t know either, but he knew what was coming. “The bird.”

 

“Miyako?” Alluka asked. “You mean, make Miyako Nanika’s host?”

 

“It’s worth a try,” Joji said, “isn’t it?”

 

Alluka was shaking her head. “I can’t ask you to risk Miyako’s life for me!”

 

“You’re not asking, and I’m not the one risking it. It’s Miyako’s choice. She loves Nanika, and Nanika loves her. She doesn’t want her to die.”

 

Slowly, Alluka pulled away from Killua. He moved to follow but he felt a gentle hand on his shoulder, stopping him. Gon. And much as he hated it, he knew that Gon was right. This moment had nothing to do with him.

 

Alluka looked at Joji, and then she looked at Miyako. “Is this really what you want?” she asked the bird.

 

Miyako cocked her head from side to side, and then croaked.

 

“She says that it is,” Joji told them with a fond smile.

 

Nanika had drifted close again. “And you, Nanika?” Alluka paused to listen, and then she said, “She wants to try.”

 

Joji nodded, and as they watched, Nanika condensed herself to the size and shape of a bird. Then she flew to Miyako, and slowly settled into her. Miyako shuddered, and fluffed her feathers, and blinked.

 

When her eyes opened again, they were bright blue.

 

2

 

They bound the unconscious Illumi and locked him in the tower, re-sealing the door. Then they set about the tedious task of finding the needles in Illumi’s army and digging them out. Gon had expected the task to take days, but Miyako/Nanika proved uncannily adept at locating them, and in the end all of the needle-people were restored by evening. One of them was the neighbor who had helped Joji’s mother hide in the woods, and she took him to retrieve her. He promised to be back later that night.

 

Once it was just the three of them again, Gon, Killua and Alluka bathed in a nearby stream – Alluka calling it a transcendent experience after so many weeks with only the odd bucket of water to wash in. Then they sat down in the castle’s kitchen with what food they were able to scrounge together and discussed what to do with Illumi.

 

“Let’s just leave him up there and go home,” Killua said dryly.

 

“No, then he might wake up and escape,” Alluka answered. “Let’s rip the bars off the window and throw him out of it. Feel free to boost Killua’s arm strength, Gon.”

 

Gon laughed, but he was aware that neither of the Zoldycks actually wanted their brother’s blood on their hands. That presented a problem, because, although Nanika-in-Miyako hadn’t shown any signs of reverting to her feral form, it was still possible that she could, and a bird was a more vulnerable host even than a human child. If all that had happened over the past month had proven anything, it was that Killua and Alluka would never be safe as long as Illumi was at large and Nanika was active. And no prison was strong enough to guarantee that he would stay contained.

 

So Gon decided to speak the idea that had been forming as he’d pulled needles from people all afternoon, though he knew that it might make both Killua and Alluka angry. “Alluka,” he said, “your hatsu is manipulating emotions, right?”

 

“Right,” she said, eyeing him curiously.

 

“But I’m guessing it doesn’t stick? Like, you can’t change them permanently.”

 

“No. The most I’ve managed is a few days. Why?”

 

“Well…I might be able to boost your aura so that you could. Change them permanently, I mean. And since Illumi’s unconscious, and he can’t block our nen, I thought maybe we could change him, so he doesn’t want all of these terrible things anymore. But if you don’t want to…”

 

Killua had begun to smile as Gon spoke, and now he was beaming. “Gon, that is a truly diabolical plan. And I think I just fell even harder for you.”

 

Alluka giggled, and Gon blushed. “Um, thank you? But Alluka has to be okay with it.”

 

“Oh, I’m more than okay with it. Let’s go right now!”

 

“Wait,” Gon said. “First we have to decide what to make him feel.”

 

“Debilitating guilt and remorse would be a good start,” Killua said. “I’m sure I can come up with more after that.”

 

But Alluka had a thoughtful look. “No,” she said. “I think I’ve got a better idea.”

 

“What?” Killua asked.

 

She smiled. “Just trust me.”

 

3

 

Despite the silence beyond the tower door, they all made sure that their ren was strong before they unlocked it. But Illumi still lay where they had tossed him in his double shackles, eyes shut and black hair splayed out over the stones in inky scribbles. They examined him in the flickering light of the candelabra Killua was holding, and when they were certain he was still unconscious, they entered the tower.

 

“So, are we agreed on this, Killua?” Alluka asked.

 

“I still think my idea was better. Or even tossing him all the way to West Gorteau. But…yeah,” he sighed. “Agreed.”

 

“Okay,” Alluka said, looking over at Gon. “You ready?”

 

Gon gave her a nod, and she closed her eyes, concentrating on her aura. She felt it envelope her like a tropical sea, its soft green tendrils moving outward, reaching for the muddy, purplish-black of Illumi’s. His aura was hard, ridged, almost scaled, and the fingers of her own aura had to push hard to breach the defenses he’d built up. But with the boost from Gon, she felt them unfurl as they never had before, not fragile but strong, striking into him, forcing their way through his barricades.

 

There was so much darkness inside of him, and it was thick and heavy as river mud. But Alluka could feel the warm, sweet light of Gon’s aura running through her, and she relaxed into it, letting it suffuse her, guide her. She wasn’t afraid to let herself go as she reached for the tiny parts of Illumi’s soul that still had light in them. They were only flecks against his vast darkness, but they were there, and Gon’s sunshine grew them into love and compassion and empathy and every other thing Alluka could think of that was the opposite of what her oldest brother had been.

 

This was why Killua loved Gon so much, she realized then. He was light, and warmth, and utter, if lawless good. And so, as she directed the golden river of Gon’s power into Illumi she also let it trickle into Killua. He needed to feel this. He needed to know what Gon was doing for them all. When she saw Killua sink to the floor, set down the candles, gaze at Gon as if the universe moved around him, she knew that she’d done the right thing. That he’d felt it, and understood, and torn through the final, frail walls that stood between him and the unmatchable love he’d denied himself for so long, for her sake.

 

4

 

It took a long time, longer than any of them had ever anticipated. By the time Gon and Alluka were finished, the candles had long since burnt out, and light was bleeding into the sky beyond the tower window. Joji stood in the doorway watching, Miyako perched on his shoulder. Killua was holding both Alluka and Gon, one exhausted beloved in each arm. But Alluka had worked her hatsu all the way to Illumi’s heart, with every one of the emotions they had agreed should rule him now, and Gon had locked them there.

 

Or so she hoped. Hope was all they could do, now.

 

Alluka turned to Joji. “Please close the door,” she said. “And send Miyako out of here.”

 

Joji nodded, shut the door, and then looked into the bird’s eyes – black again. Nanika must be sleeping. He didn’t speak out loud, but Miyako seemed to listen, and then flew off through the window.

 

When the bird was gone, Alluka looked at Killua. “I guess it’s time to see if it worked.”

 

Killua nodded, and Alluka moved away from him. She was immeasurably grateful when Joji stepped forward and put an arm around her.

 

“Do you need me for this?” Gon asked Killua, his voice shaking with weariness.

 

“No,” Killua said, turning to Gon and reaching for his hand, squeezing it. “This is an easy one.”

 

The look they exchanged was enough to make Alluka blush. Then Killua turned reluctantly from Gon, let go of his hand. He clasped his own hands together and then pulled them apart, blue threads of electricity strung between them. When they were crackling brightly, he leaned down and touched his hands to the sides of Illumi’s head. Illumi convulsed, his back arching off the floor, and then, abruptly, he sat up. Everyone backed away from him.    

 

Illumi looked down at his double-bound hands and feet, and then he looked up at the four of them standing in the doorway. “Killua? Alluka?” he said in a voice that was nothing like his own. It was tremulous, uncertain – even frightened.

 

“How are you feeling, Illumi?” Killua asked cautiously, his electricity still in his hands.

 

Illumi blinked at them all for a moment. Then he whispered, “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry…” And he bowed his head, and wept.

 

5

 

“I didn’t think that Illumi could get any worse,” Killua grumbled to Gon as he crawled into the bed they’d found in one of the castle’s intact rooms. Its mattress and pillows were musty. He was too tired to care. “But this is officially worse.”

 

“Well,” Gon said, pulling off his shirt, “he has a lot of years of being a general shit to feel bad about.”

 

“Yeah, but he’s been crying for _three fucking hours!_ Is he ever going to stop?”

 

Gon laughed softly, and unbuttoned his shorts. “I don’t know. But right now, it’s not our problem.”

 

It was true. After those tedious hours of listening to Illumi cry and berate himself, Alluka declared him no longer a threat and insisted that Gon and Killua go and rest. She and Joji would watch Illumi. Reluctantly, Killua had agreed. He hadn’t said it to any of them, but he was still weak and shaky from the poison. He was already drifting toward sleep when Gon crawled into bed beside him, wrapped his warm, naked body around him.

 

“You’re wearing too much, Killua,” Gon said.

 

“Gon,” Killua groaned, “I can’t right now. Just…too…tired.”

 

“It’s okay,” Gon said, kissing his neck. “I am too. But you almost died, Killua. And I need to hold you, without anything in the way.”

 

Killua sighed. “Okay,” he said, and without opening his eyes, he let Gon help him wriggle out of his clothes. When Gon curled around him again, he was glad he had. He drifted into sleep to the sound of birdsong and soft wind through leaves and Gon’s steady heart, strong and alive and beating for him.

 


	16. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which you get the migraine-inducing fluff I've been promising you all along!

**i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)**

Turquoise waves lapped the beach, and there was just enough breeze that it wasn’t too hot. The sand gleamed golden in the early evening light, the sky unfolded in boundless, cloudless layers of blue.

 

Gon didn’t think he’d ever seen two people look as happy as Leorio and Kurapika did, standing with clasped hands and gazing into each other’s eyes as they spoke the words they’d written to pledge themselves to each other. Even Liana, dressed as a fairy princess and fuelled with sugar and adult attention and armed with a basket of flower petals, was subdued as she watched her fathers’ ceremony.

 

“Before Leorio and Kurapika exchange rings,” the celebrant said, “they have asked that their best man, Killua, give a reading.”

 

Gon looked up at Killua in surprise from his place beside Leorio. He hadn’t known this; why hadn’t Killua told him? But Killua only gave him a small smile before he stepped forward, drew a sheet of paper from his pocket, and faced the gathered guests. “Leorio and Kurapika asked me to choose a reading that I thought best summed up their love for each other,” he said. “They also asked that I keep it a secret until now, even from them. So. I hope that I’ve chosen well.” He glanced down at the page briefly, and then up again. He began to speak, words he clearly knew by heart, and Gon’s eyes slowly filled with tears.

 

“i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

                                                                            i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

 

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

 

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)” *

 

Gon wasn’t the only one crying by the time Killua finished speaking. There were tears on the faces of many of the guests, and streaming down Leorio’s cheeks, and Kurapika was smiling and openly sobbing. Killua returned to his place beside Kurapika, but his eyes rested on Gon’s for the remainder of the ceremony, the same sweet, soft blue as the sky.

 

When the rings were exchanged and the kisses given, the guests followed the wedding couple back up the hill toward their house and a reception that would no doubt last all night. But Gon and Killua hung back until they were the only ones left on the quiet beach in the setting sun.

 

“Killua. That poem. Did you…do you remember me saying those words to you, about the moon?”

 

Killua was looking out to sea, his face dreamy and his eyes in the past. “I don’t remember much of what happened after Illumi poisoned me,” he said at last. “Mostly just your face above me, and this feeling while I looked at you…love, but also despair, because I knew that once I closed my eyes, I would never see you again. I know that you were speaking to me, but I can’t remember most of what you said. That line of poetry, though…somehow, that stuck.”

 

He turned back to Gon and took his hands, and Gon squeezed them tightly, holding their warmth against the terrible memory of them growing cold and still in his grasp, almost exactly a year ago today. “I didn’t remember it all at first,” Killua continued. “But words started to come back to me here and there, and when I had enough of them, I looked it up. That poem, Gon…it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever read.”

 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Gon asked, and then he added, “Oh, no, I understand. You were saving it for Leorio and Kurapika. It was the perfect poem for them.” And although he was a little bit hurt by this, he couldn’t grudge Killua sharing it with them as he had.

 

But Killua was shaking his head. “I was saving it,” he agreed, “but not for them. I saved it for us, Gon. Because every one of those words describes the way I feel about you. And I hope you know that when I spoke them today, I spoke them to you.”

 

“Killua…” Gon said softly, tears swirling his vision again.  

 

“I’ve carried that poem with me for six months,” Killua said, retrieving one of his hands to reach into his pocket. When he brought it out there was something folded in his pale fingers, and he held his closed hand between them. “I hope I chose the right time to offer it back to you.”

 

He opened his hand. A ring rested on his palm, a simple gold band engraved with the words: _whatever a sun will always sing is you_

 

Gon looked at the ring, and then up at Killua. “I…Killua, are you asking…?”

 

“Yes, Gon. I’m asking you to marry me.”

 

“Yes! Yes, yes, yes!” Gon flung himself at Killua so hard that they both stumbled and toppled into the sand.

 

“You sure about that?” Killua laughed when Gon stopped kissing him. “You seem a little uncertain.”

 

“Put the ring on me, Killua,” Gon said, holding out his right hand. Killua slipped the band onto his ring finger. It fit perfectly. “It’s beautiful,” Gon said, turning it this way and that against the deepening sky. “I only wish I had one for you.”

 

“Well…” Killua said, blushing a little and rummaging again in his pocket. “I kind of thought you might say that. So I had another one made, too.” He put another ring into Gon’s hand, the same as Gon’s but made of some silvery metal, and inscribed with the line about the moon. “You can give this to me…or if you want to choose something yourself, that’s okay, too.”

 

“No, it’s perfect! This is exactly what I would have chosen.” Gon took Killua’s hand and slipped the other ring onto it. For a time after that they just lay in the sand, heads together and hands intertwined as the first stars made bright pinpricks in the cornflower sky.

 

“We’ll have to call Aunt Mito and Abe,” Gon said at last. “And Alluka and Joji. And Illumi.”

 

“Gods, no!” Killua groaned. “He’ll probably cry for six hours, and then start planning some hideous elaborate wedding at the fucking family estate.”

 

Gon laughed, but said firmly, “No, we have to tell Illumi. He loves you now, and besides, I want to tell everybody!”

 

Killua laughed. “Well, as soon as we go to that reception, most of the everybodies we would tell are going to know about it. Us showing up with matching rings after a conspicuous absence isn’t exactly subtle. In fact…” he frowned, “maybe I should have waited till tomorrow to do this. I don’t want us to steal Leorio and Kurapika’s thunder.”

 

But Gon shook his head. “They won’t see it like that. They’ll be happy. But not as happy as I am.” Gon kissed him again, and then he pulled away and asked, “Are _you_ as happy as I am, Killua?”

 

“Maybe happier,” Killua said after a moment’s thought. “You grew up happy. I grew up thinking I would never be. This is – you are…Gon, you’re like some kind of miracle.”

 

“I’m no miracle,” Gon said, though his heart swelled at the words. He still wasn’t used to Killua speaking so openly, though he’d been doing so since his brush with death, and it delighted Gon every time he did. “This is just us, together. Like we were always supposed to be. Promise me we always will be?”

 

Killua smiled at him through the last of the light. “Pinky swear?”

 

Gon grinned back. “Pinky swear. But what do we have to swallow? I mean, needles and slugs are definitely out, and there aren’t many things that I wouldn’t – ”

 

“No, please, do NOT finish that sentence!”

 

“What? What do you…oh. Right. But I didn’t actually mean to say – ”

 

“Gon,” Killua laughed. “Do you honestly never listen to yourself?”

 

Gon shrugged. “So how about we just skip to the kiss?”

 

Killua gazed at him, constellations reflected in his eyes, and Gon couldn’t quite believe that someone so rare and precious wanted to be his forever. But he did. The circle of gold warming his finger proved it.

 

“Sounds good,” Killua said.

 

“Okay then. You and me until the end of the world?”

 

“No,” Killua said, “I’ll be yours even after that.”

 

Killua pulled him close and kissed him, and Gon knew that they would have to stop soon, to re-join the others. But in this perfect moment only the two of them existed, first friends, best friends, and the rest of the world could wait for them just a little longer.

 

~ The End ~

 

* poem by e.e. Cummings

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want to thank each and every one of you who's read and left kudos and comments and otherwise followed me on this first foray of mine into long fanfiction. It's been an amazing and humbling experience, and I've met a lot of lovely people - I hope you'll stay in touch. I still can't figure out how to do a tumblr link but I'm @glittercracker there so come chat with me anytime. And here's one more shoutout to my betas, losing_sanity_fast, knightofthesixthmagnitudeofstars and especially the lovely fireolin. She is the reason that this fic exists at all. I can never thank her enough for encouraging me to start writing fanfiction, and for reading so many drafts of this with unending patience and attention to detail. She is an amazing writer as well as an amazing editor, so please look for her fics! Meanwhile, hugs and Godspeed to you all! <3


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